Hooker, Sir Joseph Dalton
JHC436
Pendock Court, Pendock, Worcestershire, United Kingdom
JDH/2/16 f.80
Thiselton-Dyer, Sir William Turner
The Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew
27-12-1881
© Descendants of Sir Joseph Dalton Hooker
Letters to Thiselton-Dyer
The Trustees of the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew
English
Original MS
4 page letter over 1 folio
 

JDH writes, in response to a letter from Sir William Turner Thiselton-Dyer [WTTD], that he is disappointed by the decision of the Board regarding Ernst Gottlieb von Steudel [and the updating of the Nomenclator Botanicus]. JDH advises WTTD to be cautious in appealing to the Board for resources for the Cryptogamic department until it is known how the division of labour on Cryptogams will fall between RBG Kew & the British Museum [of Natural History] under Lefever. JDH also speculates that Algernon Freeman-Mitford may not be first Commissioner [of Works] much longer & this may have a bearing on the matter. Comments on the length of a biography of [Charles] Lyell & wonders whether Hughes will write up the life of Adam Sedgewick. It was foggy in the Severn Valley the day JDH travelled to Pendock, picking up Harriet [Thiselton-Dyer nee Hooker] on the way, at Gloucester. En route JDH saw Frederick William Waller, who he is thinking about engaging to do some building work. JDH is working on Aroideae, his final contribution to GEBERA PLANTARUM. He finds Heinrich Engler's arrangement of Aroideae unnatural & his descriptions verbose. In a post script JDH thanks WTTD for forwarding a Gas Company receipt.

Transcript

an arrangement, which gives equally habit & character of infloresceae & flowers should be a natural classification. I know the order pretty well, & hope to get the skeleton finished here if I wait a day or two longer for it.
With best love to Harriet & the weans & kind regards from all here | Ever aff[ectionately]
Y[ou]r Jos D Hooker [signature]
Thanks for forwarding the Gas C[ompan]y receipt, which was for a call, I tremble for the consequences!

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Pendock*1
Tuesday,
December 27th 1881*2
Dear Dyer*3
Your packet and welcome letter arrived today, via "Nash Mills" to which you had inadvertently redirected it. It was accompanied by a letter from Evans, repeating the kind message regarding Charlie [Charles Paget Hooker]. The enclosure from the Board in re[gards] Steudel*4 upset me: that such good--tidings should be read by a suspicion of underhand dealing that should have blinded the readers to the clearest & most explicit statements is disheartening & I am puzzled how to answer it. My first thoughts were to suggest a re reading of the letter, but on second thoughts I have kept the letter for calmer moments. I do not remember ever to have had a worse time with the Board -- it is a long lane that has no turning & we

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must just be patient.
I quite agree as to the requirements of the Cryptogamic Department, but we must take care lest by making our wants too urgent we may not suggest to the Board the division of labor with the B[ritish] M[useum]. If such an idea was to suggest itself to a man like Lefever,*5 he would attempt to carry it through. Let the B[ritish] M[useum] appear as the chief sinner in the matter of demands for aid, & we shall profit in the long run. I feel that Mitford*6 won't continue in the Office if he has a chance of escape; & it is difficult to say whether he prompted the F[irst] C[ommissioner] to the "concurrence"; or the F[irst] Commissioner] made him write the minute. Lefever is ignorant enough for any thing, & Mitford should know better.
It is curious how like estimates of Lyells*7 life, I mean regarding the length of the book[,] vary with the acquaintance the reader has with the times & people it treats of. I would

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reduce it one half, Darwin*8 one quarter, you three quarters. I wonder whether Hughes will ever bring out Sedgewick's*9 life.
I have no news here. On the day we went down a blinding fog, as bad as London, enveloped the Severn Valley. We picked up Harriet at Gloucester & I saw young Waller*10 who I think of employing to build for me, as he is anxious to set up in London, & I like what I have seen of his work & heard of himself.
I am working all day at Aroideae, my final contribution to Gen[era] Plant[arum]. All Engler's*11 work might have gone into ¼ the space with advantage, he is a cumbrous describer, & I do think his arrangement most unnatural. It is difficult to believe that he has really been able with such things as dried Aroids to establish a correct arrangement formatted on the composition & disposition of lactiferous vessels[?], & more difficult to suppose that such

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an arrangement, which gives equally habit & character of infloresceae & flowers should be a natural classification. I know the order pretty well, & hope to get the skeleton finished here if I wait a day or two longer for it.
With best love to Harriet & the weans & kind regards from all here | Ever aff[ectionately]
Y[ou]r Jos D Hooker [signature]
Thanks for forwarding the Gas C[ompan]y receipt, which was for a call, I tremble for the consequences!

ENDNOTES


1. Pendock was a Worcestershire village where Lady Hyacinth Hooker owned "a very out of the way property." Her father, William Samuel Symonds had been Rector of Pendock.
2. The date, apart from the day, has been added as a pencil annotation, written in another hand.
3. Sir William Turner Thiselton--Dyer (1843--1928). British botanist and third Director of the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew (1885--1905). He succeeded Joseph Hooker in the role after serving as his Assistant Director for ten years. He previously held professorships at the Royal Agricultural College, Cirencester, Royal College of Science for Ireland and the Royal Horticultural Society. He married Hooker's eldest daughter Harriet in 1877.
4. Probably refers to Ernst Gottlieb von Steudel's Nomenclator Botanicus (1821-- 1824), an alphabetical listing of approximately 40,000 species of plants, representing all known species to the year 1840. In his 1880 report on the Royal Botanical Gardens, Kew, Joseph Hooker appealed for clerical help to keep the interleaved copy of the Nomenclator up to date. It was later superseded by the Index Kewensis.
5. George Shaw Lefevre, 1st Baron Eversley (1831--1928) was a British Liberal Party politician. He was First Commissioner of Works 1881--1885 and also served as Postmaster General.
6. Algernon Bertam Freeman-Mitford, 1st Baron of Redesdale (1837--1916). British diplomat, collector and writer. From 1874 to 1886 he acted as secretary to HM Office of Works.
7. Sir Charles Lyell (1797--1875). British lawyer and the foremost geologist of his day. He is best known as the author of Principles of Geology.
8. Charles Robert Darwin (1809--1882). English naturalist and geologist best known for his contributions to evolutionary theory. He was a great friend of Joseph Hooker before and after the publication of On the Origin of Species in 1859. Hooker took his Voyage of the Beagle as a model for his own travel journals.
9. Adam Sedgwick (1785--1873). One of the founders of modern geology. Though he had guided the young Charles Darwin in his early study of geology and they continued to be on friendly terms, he was an opponent off Darwin's theory of evolution by naturel selection. The Life and Letters of the Reverend Adam Sedgwick by J. W. Clark and T. M. Hughes was published in 1890.
10. Frederick William Waller (1846--1933). Son of Gloucestershire architect Frederick Sandham Waller. He was taken into partnership by his father in 1873.
11. Heinrich Gustave Adolf Engler (1844--1930). German botanist, notable for his work on plant taxonomy and phytogeography. His system of classification, the Engler System is still used by many Herbaria and is followed by many manuals and floras.

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