George Simonds Boulger

“ Although it is commonly attributed, on the ground of a modest remark of Grew's, to Sir Thomas Millington, it is probable that to Grew himself belongs the credit of first observing the true existence of sex in plants. Grew has suffered somewhat from an over-conciseness of style, and has been unfortunate in his translators. `The Anatomy begun' was translated into French by Le Vasseur in 1675, and the first three books of the 'Anatomy of Plants' were badly rendered into Latin in Germany. ”

“ Mary the Less, Cambridge. On the death in 1827 of Thomas Martyn, in whose hands the professorship of botany had for thirty years been a sinecure, Henslow was appointed to the chair. He shortly afterwards resigned the professorship of mineralogy, and held the botanical chair for the remainder of his life. His enthusiasm rendered botany a popular subject in the university, and his excursions and soirées were attended by men of various tastes, Darwin, Berkeley, and Babington being among his pupils. Darwin, his favourite pupil, always expressed the highest regard for him. ”

“ The last collection, with that of Professor Balfour, amounting to fifty thousand species, represented by about ten times as many specimens, formed the nucleus of the Edinburgh university herbarium. An outdoor naturalist, fond in his younger days of his rod and his gun, he was a man of many-sided culture, agreeable in society, musical, with an artist's eye, and considerable literary taste. ”

“ Bewly, being well read in natural philosophy, gained Gough's attention. He made good progress in Latin, but preferred books dealing with natural history. At the age of eight he began studying plants by touch. When thirteen he had recourse to the ‘Synopsis of British Plants,’ by John Wilson of Kendal, and afterwards to the works of Gerard, Parkinson, Hudson, Withering, and Smith, which he had read to him until he knew them by heart. ”

“ GRAY, SAMUEL FREDERICK (fl. 1780–1836) , naturalist and pharmacologist, was the posthumous son of Samuel Frederick Gray, the anonymous translator of Linnæus's ‘Philosophia Botanica’ for James Lee's ‘Introduction to Botany.’ Born after his patrimony had been distributed, he was entirely dependent on his own industry, and from 1800 to his death suffered from disease of the lungs. He became a pharmaceutical chemist at Walsall in Staffordshire, where his second son, John Edward Gray [q. v.] , was born; but soon after this removed to London, his son George Robert Gray [q. v.] ”

“ HANCOCK, ALBANY (1806–1873) , zoologist, was second son and third child of John Hancock, a saddler and ironmonger of Newcastle-on-Tyne, a man of exceptional cultivation, possessing a microscope and a small library containing works of Pliny, Linnæus, Lister, Donovan, and Bewick, and the 'Philosophical Transactions.' John Hancock had also made collections of plants, insects, and especially of shells, and though he died when Albany was six years old, so thoroughly did his widow carry on his teaching that, of their six children, four devoted themselves to the study of natural history. ”

“ LOUDON, JOHN CLAUDIUS (1783–1843) , landscape-gardener and horticultural writer, son of a farmer, was born at Cambuslang, Lanarkshire, 8 April 1783. As a child he evinced fondness for gardening, and was sent to live with an uncle in Edinburgh in order to obtain a good education. He made rapid progress in drawing and arithmetic, overcame an initial dislike to Latin, and took copious notes on botany and chemistry, illustrated with clever pen-and-ink sketches. ”

“ The fines were spent on the school library, on fives-courts, and other improvements, and on a dole of bread to the poor. He encouraged a love of gardening and habits of business among his pupils, and ‘thought it of much more use to’ them ‘to study their own language with accuracy than a dead one.’ Among his pupils, who averaged eighty in number, were Addington (Lord Sidmouth) , the first Lord Redesdale, and his brother, Colonel William Mitford, the historian. During his long summer vacations Gilpin undertook those sketching tours by the publication of which he afterwards became so well known. ”

“ Lindley was frequently consulted by government. Thus, in 1838, he reported on the condition of Kew Gardens, recommending that they should be made over to the nation, and should ultimately become the headquarters of botanical science for the empire. During the potato famine he was sent by Peel to Ireland, and he also advised as to the planting of the island of Ascension. He acted as juror in the exhibition of 1851 for food-products, and although he suffered then from the overwork entailed, he was persuaded in 1862 to take charge of the entire colonial department of the exhibition of that year. ”

“ He received a good village education, and was brought up to his father's trade, but removed to Yarmouth before he was twenty, where until 1801 he kept a small school in Fighting-cock Row. He acquired some knowledge of Latin, Greek, and French, was a skilled arithmetician, and wrote a beautifully neat ‘copperplate’ hand; while his love of botany and skill as a collector procured him the acquaintance of Dr. John Aikin, Thomas Jenkinson Woodward, Sir James Edward Smith, and Dawson Turner. He was chiefly devoted to the study of algæ, in which he seems to have initiated Dawson Turner. ”

“ In 1809 he took up for a time the study of the violin, to which he returned forty years later; and in 1810, having been ill, his attention was first directed to the influence of air upon health, upon which subject he wrote in the ‘Philosophical Magazine.’ The great comet of 1811 directed his attention to astronomy; and in 1812, having been, from his study of Pythagorean and Hindu philosophy and an inherited dislike of cruelty to animals, for some years a vegetarian, he published ‘Reflections on Spirituous Liquors,’ denying man to be by birth a carnivor. ”

“ Cornus suecica, discovered by Penny in the Cheviots, and other rare plants from both the north and the south of England, credited to him in L'Obel's ‘Adversaria’ (1570–1) and in Gerard's ‘Herball,’ show him to have been a diligent botanist. Gerard styles him ‘a second Dioscorides,’ and his friend Clusius, besides other plants, named the plant now known as Hypericum balearicum, Myrtocistus Pennæi in honour of its discoverer. ”

“ His herbarium, bequeathed to the Apothecaries' Company, is now in the British Museum, and the neat and elaborate tickets to the plants, many of which he obtained from the Chelsea garden, and numerous correspondents, show him to have been a botanist of no mean calibre. ”

“ Between 1823 and 1828 twenty-five papers by Haworth appeared in the ‘Philosophical Magazine,’ and he also contributed to the ‘Transactions’ of the Linnean and Horticultural societies. Between 1812 and 1819 Haworth wrote a poem in twenty-four cantos, entitled ‘Cottingham,’ part only of which was published in a local newspaper, and that part not evincing much poetic power. Though he never travelled beyond his own country, Haworth was a sound naturalist on all subjects, and his contributions to science are of lasting value. ”

“ Davy and others withdrew their names, but Greenough adhered to his original scheme of an independent society, acting as its president for six years, and being subsequently re-elected in 1818 and 1833. His presidential addresses to the society are among his chief contributions to geology; but he was proficient also in architecture and in archæology, and took a deep interest in ethnology. At an early date he began to form a collection of maps, upon which or in his note-books he entered all the geological data he could obtain from travellers and from books. ”

“ This herbarium, by far the richest ever accumulated in one man's lifetime, was after his death purchased by the nation.
Hooker always rose early, went little into society, and retired late. He was able, in addition to purely official duties, to produce either as author or editor about one hundred volumes devoted to systematic and economic botany. These contain descriptions of many thousand species, and are illustrated by about five thousand plates. ”

“ Piqued by his rejection, Gray turned his attention mainly to zoology. In 1819 he had joined the London Philosophical Society, and he now became fellow and secretary of the Entomological Society, and in 1824 was engaged by John George Children [q. v.] , Dr. Leach's successor, to assist in preparing a catalogue of the British Museum collection of reptiles. In 1826 he married Maria Emma [see Gray, Maria Emma] , the widow of a cousin. From the date of his entering the British Museum began his remarkable activity in contributing to scientific literature, especially on zoological subjects. ”

“ In 1808 he founded the Wernerian Natural History Society, and throughout his life he kept the scientific world in England informed as to the progress of science in Germany. In conjunction with Sir David Brewster he, in 1819, originated the ‘Edinburgh Philosophical Journal,’ of which, from its tenth volume, he was the sole editor until his death. ”

“ Syntax.’ The style of the writings has been characterised (loc. cit.) as ‘too poetic ... but full of ingenious reflections, and free from exaggeration ... truthful and warm, but free from false vague enthusiasm.’ His drawings are described by Michael Tyson (Nichols, Lit. Anecd. viii. 643) as ‘rather studies for landscape-painters than portraits of particular places.’ Some skill in drawing seems to have been hereditary in his family, his father being a skilful draughtsman, and Benjamin West being one of his cousins. ”

“ His papers appear in the 'Memoirs of the Geological Survey of Ireland,' the 'Geological Magazine,' the 'Journal of the Royal Geological Society of Ireland,' and the 'Transactions' of the Royal Irish Academy and of the Royal Dublin Society. Hardman was an able chemist and geologist, a clever draughtsman, and a genial companion. ”

“ In this latter year he went to Freiburg, to study for nearly two years under Werner, after which he devoted two years to continental travel. On his return to Edinburgh in 1804 he was appointed regius professor of natural history and keeper of the university museum in succession to Dr. Walker. As a teacher he attracted numerous pupils, excited their enthusiasm, keenly measured their abilities, and retained their friendship in after-life. ”

“ In 1840 he succeeded J. G. Children as keeper of the zoological department of the British Museum, a post which he retained until the December preceding his death. Though subsequently to 1840 he issued several independent zoological works, such as the ‘Synopsis of British Mollusks,’ 1852, the great work of his life was the increasing the collection in his charge, and the organisation and editing of the splendid series of descriptive catalogues of its treasures. ”

“ Being regular and orderly in his habits, he was able, though in partnership with his father, to spare time for the study of science, for which he had an ardent love. He collected British plants, especially mosses, and also shells and fossil plants. In 1836 he joined the Edinburgh Botanical Society, and in 1841 the Glasgow Philosophical Society. In 1855 he became a fellow of the Linnean Society. He took an active part in the promotion of various benevolent institutions, and in 1855 acted as local secretary in connection with the Glasgow meeting of the British Association. ”

“ He was the main author of the first edition of Aiton's ‘Hortus Kewensis,’ published in 1789, and of part of the second edition, issued between 1810 and 1813, and he edited Roxburgh's ‘Plants of the Coromandel Coast,’ between 1795 and 1798; but his ‘magnum opus’ was the ‘Catalogus Bibliothecæ Historico-Naturalis Josephi Banks, Baronetti,’ London, 1796–1800, 5 vols., of which Sir James Smith writes that ‘a work so ingenious in design and so perfect in execution can scarcely be produced in any science.’ Dryander died at the Linnean Society's house in Soho Square 19 Oct. ”

“ At the conclusion of his year of office as mayor he again visited England to consult with Hannah, Penn's widow (Penn had died in 1718 and his eldest son in 1720) . In 1725, after his return to Pennsylvania, Logan became involved in a controversy with Governor Sir William Keith, who was superseded in 1726. In the course of the dispute he published ‘The Antidote,’ Philadelphia, 1725, and ‘A Memorial from James Logan in behalf of the Proprietor's family and of himself, Servant to the said family,’ 1726. In 1728 Logan was maimed for life by a fall in which he broke off the head of his thighbone ”

“ His father, Alexander Garden, was born in Scotland in 1685, and went out to Charleston in 1719 as a clergyman of the church of England, becoming rector of St. Philip's Church, and being chiefly remembered for a controversy in 1740 with the Rev. George Whitefield. He died in 1756. Garden was sent home to Scotland for his education, studied medicine at Edinburgh, where he graduated M.D., and was a pupil in botany of Alston. ”

“ Two years later he was apprenticed to William Griffin, a skilful fruit-grower, gardener to Samuel Smith of Woodhall Park, Watton, Hertfordshire. In 1821 he returned as gardener to Battlesden, and there constructed a large lake. In 1823 he was for a brief period in the service of the Duke of Somerset at Wimbledon. But when, in the same year, the Horticultural Society leased the Chiswick gardens from the Duke of Devonshire, and engaged in reconstructing them, Paxton, to improve himself, obtained employment there in the arboretum. ”

“ HUGHES, GRIFFITH (fl. 1750) , naturalist, was perhaps the son of Edward Hughes of Towyn, Merionethshire, who was born about 1707, matriculated at St. John's College, Oxford, in 1729, and graduated B.A. and M.A. in 1748. ”

“ In that year Wight was appointed to succeed Dr. Shuter as naturalist at Madras, and for two or three years had charge, as such, of the botanical establishment there, employing native draughtsmen, making an extensive tour in the southern provinces, the route of which is marked on the map in Wallich's 'Plantre Asiatics Rariores,' and collecting and distributing among botanists a great number of duplicates. In 1828, on the abolition of his office, Wight was appointed garrison surgeon at Negapatam, and thoroughly explored that neighbourhood and Tanjore ”

“ In 1867 he joined in founding the Perthshire Society of Natural Science, of which he was president from 1867 to 1872 and from 1884 to 1892, secretary from 1872 to 1874, and editor from 1874 to 1884 and from 1892 to 1894. His communications to this society, many of which are printed in its 'Proceedings' and 'Transactions,' number a hundred, and it is by following the scheme mapped out in his presidential addresses that the museum of this society at Perth has become recognised as a model for all local museums. ”