[[1]]
Kew
March 24th / [18]54
Dear [Asa] Gray
Very many thanks for your capital long letter, which begins by agreeing with me that,
"the subject does not admit[?] of close reasoning", & goes on with as pretty a
specimen of admirable close clear & accurate reasoning as I ever wish to peruse. I
only wish you had taken up the subject instead of me, for you throw out your
grapnels &c with a judgement & precision that puts my loose ratiocination (is that the
word?) to shame. You must (probably do) know that I am one of those cross-grained fellows who, after building up a tall tottering castle, get sick of it & can’t bear a
kind friend coming to prop it up: neither do I like an enemy to knock it down: so there
is no pleasing me but by praising my castle in the abstract! Whether it stands or falls!
I entirely agree with all you say about representative species & groan over the hitch
in deciding what we are to agree to call a species in such cases. I also fully
[[2]] agree that the fundamentality of this argument derived from genetic
resemblance is not fully appreciated by myself : one is apt to overlook it’s real whole
weight, from being accustomed to bear it*1 (like atmospheric pressure) it is per se
unanswerable & hence put aside for less valuable facts that afford scope for
reasoning & debate? I am hence the more glad that I wound up my chapter with the
quotation from you, for which I do not deserve the credit, which I hope others will
attach to its introduction. I put it in as much out of for the sake of strengthening my
argument by quoting one known to be so able to judge as you are; as for what it
said. I believed in you in short quite as much as in what you wrote. The said
paragraph admirably embodies the doctrine & makes up in a great degree for my
omission. Thomson & I have been flirting with the subject again in the Introductory
Essay to the Flora Indica but we have confined ourselves to pointing out the chief
[[3]] facts & conclusions for the information of Indian Botanists. The said introductory
essay will be a very long affair, probably 150 pages 8vo & will give a long account of
the History & progress of Bot[anical] collectors & collections & authors on Indian
plants: also an Essay on the climate of India & a full geographical account of the
provinces. It has cost us a great deal of labour & will we hope prove useful.
I am getting on with the distribution, naming as well as I can & keeping a very full set
for Hook Herb[arium]. Until some rules are made (to be kept) about nomenclature
we shall never get on. I am now at Antidesmas, with Tulasne's paper; it is extremely
carefully & well done for its materials, but these are so indifferent that the whole
paper is a most imperfect one. Surely it is not wise or fair, that a man should
undertake to monographise an order upon materials which he must now[sic] are
wholly insufficient. There is not one good Indian collection in Paris except
Jaquemonts which is too far north for Antidesmas: nor is there a good Java
[[4]] or Malayan collection: consequently here is Tulasne's paper published in
ignorance of more than half Wallich[']s, Cumming[']s, Wight[']s, & all Griffith[']s & Roxburgh[']s
plants. This is sadly detrimental to science, for it compells[sic] a succeeding Botanist
to go over the whole ground again. It is very true that all these materials which he
has not, would not swell his numbers much, but they would I suspect dismiss in them
very materially, which is of far more importance. *2Added to this he has not
consulted Wight[']s Icones, Roxburgh Flora Indica or Commercial[?] Plants!
We have noted what you say about Torrey before Lowell & about Sullivant, thanks
for both hints. I hope it was not S[ullivant] who sent the Jungermannia for a new
Selaginella!
I have not gone into your larch, thanks for the hint as to its phyllotaxis. As to Yew,
what indeed is habit in that plant? wild or cultivated is all the same to it. it is never
alike -- I hope you will be able to go into Junipers one day. I took a house for
Bentham the other day on the side of the green opposite the Gardens with back to
river, it is a small genteel looking house close up to the corner of the green,
consequently close to the K[ing] of
[[5]] Hanover's old house where my fathers Herb[arium] now is. The rent is awful £147
a year but there is not another to be had & rents are rising fast here. He gets in on
15th of April & his collection will be set at once. We have a tolerable Herb[arium] curator
but very ignorant. My own plans are quite unsettled & I sometimes think seriously of
giving up Kew & living in London & writing for the Press. The fact is I have another
baby expected & really can hardly support myself on this Gov[ernmen]t pay, which
engrosses all my time & entails very heavy expenses. Living here is most expensive
& I have no advantages except my Fathers Herb[arium] & Library which are private &
for which I am in no way indebted to the Crown. If they would give me a cottage or
something or other to help me on it would be better, but at present it is a struggle & I
see no prospect of an amelioration. My £400 salary expires next November & I
hardly expect its renewal *3 PS My father has written to the W & Forests [Office of
Woods and Forests] to ask that something be done for me. -- My Father, sanguine
as usual ever, buoys me up with hopes of the W & F [Office of Woods & Forests]
doing something, but I do not seem a bit nearer to it than I was 3[?] years ago. Pray
[[6]] do not think I am grumbling. I have had a long spell of pure pleasure as a purely
scientific botanist & it is time I felt some of the ills of my position -- it does make me
very anxious though & were it not that my Father would feel my leaving the place, I
would hang no more on in this suspense.
Poor [Nathaniel] Wallich is you will be sorry to hear very ill with his cough &
Bronchitis & now continued fever for 5 days -- I do fear the worst, not being allowed
to see him when I called two days ago. Brown is vivacious on the whole, but apt to
ail.
The V[an] D[iemen's] Land*4 Gov[ernmen]t voted me £300 in their Legislation council
the other day, desiring me to send them 6 copies of the forthcoming Flora of their
plants[?] & to put the rest in my pocket as a renumeration[sic] for my southern Floras
which they (rightly) understand have not paid me a shilling. This is very promising
from young Tasmania & comes most opportunely to me with the present crisis.
[[7]] I have been dabbling a little at Fossil plants again, & have made out pretty
clearly that the Trigonocarpi of the coal formation are coniferous: & I have been
fortunate in procuring specimens full of structures of fruits entirely similar in their
integuments to a Salisburia with the fleshy coat drawn up into a long snout with a
longitudinal canal from the apex to the nut, which has two inner membraneous coats. It
has been a long & troublesome job, owing to the difficulty of getting specimens &
expense of cutting then into transparent slices for microscopic examination. Oddly
enough some leaves of the coal formation referred to Palms & Cycadeae by
Brongnart were compared (justly) to Salisburia by Lindley, adding to which the fact of
coniferous wood abounding in the coal [one word crossed out, illeg.] build up a
tolerable argument in favour.
I am just now in the councils of 3 Societies, Royal, Linnean & Geological which I find
take up a great deal of time : the first & last especially not being synecures[sic] at
all, but I find it necessary to keep my name before people
[[8]] as willing to contribute my quota to science in every way. We have just
arranged for a monthly publication of the Proceedings of the R[oyal] S[ociety] & also
for the contribution of contributions short papers to the society, not intended for the
transactions but for the proceedings: it is to go by post monthly to every member &
non resident strangers are to subscribe to it at about 8/ a year. This is a great move
& I intend to send occasional abstracts of my proceedings with amongst the Indian
plants to be then read to the Society & published. A small band of us y'clept[sic] -the Philaophial[philosophical?] club, have promoted the thing. The other day I
carried a point in the Linnean Society that I have long been trying; the appointment
of a committee to report on the state of the whole Botanical collections which are in
disgraceful order (all but Linnean & Smithian) & I hope we shall make a Reform.
Brown was very savage about it. By the way do you get your copy of the
Transactions? The society will not send them out to foreign members which I think
disgraceful, I wish you would complain.
Reinwardt is dead at Leyden [Leiden].
We are all well here & join to send regards to yourself & Mrs Gray
Ever affectionately yrs J. D. Hooker [signature]
ENDNOTES
1. The phrase '(like atmospheric pressure)' has been inserted and extends below the
words 'this per'. The added phrase extends across the fold onto page 3.
2. The sentence 'Added to this....Plants!' was added by Hooker after the main body
of text was written.
3. The line 'P.S. ....for me' is written in the left hand margin at right angles to the
original text.
4. Van Diemen's Land was the original name used by Europeans for the island of
Tasmania.
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