Hooker, Sir Joseph Dalton
JHC554
The Camp, Sunningdale, Berkshire, United Kingdom
JDH/2/16 f.196
Thiselton-Dyer, Sir William Turner
The Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew
31-12-1908
© 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
 
Transcript

his papers in the Kew Catalogue were procured for me by Heer himself, who most kindly endeavored to collect all he could for me. Had Heer really anticipated Forbes it A.D.C. [De Candolle] must allude to it; he cannot have overlooked it.
Stepf's*6 promotion is a great pleasure to me. He often comes here for Sunday. I am glad too that his wife's health is so greatly improved. I wonder who will get the assistantship; Sprague*7 I should think.
I have seen & wondered at your great activity in Indian matters now that you are so far from town. Gage*8 is, I fear[,] far from a capable man, I am sorry that Burkill*9 is not at the head of the Calcutta Garden. He keeps an eye on Impatiens for for[sic] me. Fancy his finding the wild I. Balsamine at the level of the sea a few miles N[orth] of Bombay -- We had it from many hilly districts all over the W[est] Peninsula. They flowered at Kew a few days ago from seeds sent by Rendle*10 from Padang, but there

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December 31, 1908*1a
THE CAMP NEAR SUNNINGDALE
My dear Dyer*1
I had just sat down to write to Harriet*2 when your letter arrived.
Your contribution to the Darwin memories volume will be both useful and welcome. I wish that I could effectually help you, but my memory is so closeted that I now mistrust it. My it to Herb.*3 recollection of Heer's* views being about the in same relation to Forbes*5, is that they were like most of the hinters at Nat. Selection as affecting to like the direction[?] of the "Origin of Species". They are, I think it probable, to be found in his ["]Memoire sur la Geographie Botanique de la Suisse", Bibl. Univ. vii (1837) -- His only earlier paper is "Bemerkungen über Lloydia serotina["] Flora xix (1836)[.] No doubt you have found much entered in the Catalogue of scientific papers of R[oyal] S[ociety][.] inmost of his papers in the Kew Catalogue. Much of

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his papers in the Kew Catalogue were procured for me by Heer himself, who most kindly endeavored to collect all he could for me. Had Heer really anticipated Forbes it A.D.C. [De Candolle] must allude to it; he cannot have overlooked it.
Stepf's*6 promotion is a great pleasure to me. He often comes here for Sunday. I am glad too that his wife's health is so greatly improved. I wonder who will get the assistantship; Sprague*7 I should think.
I have seen & wondered at your great activity in Indian matters now that you are so far from town. Gage*8 is, I fear[,] far from a capable man, I am sorry that Burkill*9 is not at the head of the Calcutta Garden. He keeps an eye on Impatiens for for[sic] me. Fancy his finding the wild I. Balsamine at the level of the sea a few miles N[orth] of Bombay -- We had it from many hilly districts all over the W[est] Peninsula. They flowered at Kew a few days ago from seeds sent by Rendle*10 from Padang, but there

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are many Padangs & I have had to ask him which. My description of the 60 species of the Paris Herbarium is printed in the "Nouvelles Archeau[?]", but not yet published. I have now full descriptions of about 170 species from China proper. I have just sent to Paris a paper on the few (about 15) known Turkish species & their distribution; they harmonise with the Malay Peninsula, but not with Mal[aya]n archipelagan or those of China proper. I shall be glad of your criticism where it appears in the forthcoming Bulletin. I think my treatment of the subject is novel, but it will not set the Thames on fire.
My whole life since I came here has been directed to Impatiens -- much of it is pure taxidermy, for Herb[ariu]m. specimens are perfectly useless without accompanying drawings of the floral organs, not one of which can be even imagined except as dissected & laid out. I can defy the sharpest eyed botanist to say from the dried flowers whether the sepals, however big, are 2 or 4 in number.
So I brag away like any other slippered pantaloon.

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A superb Impatiens arrived for Kew today, collected by one of Sander's*10 scouts in Siam [Thailand]. Whence Kew had only [one number crossed through, illeg.] 4 species, it is allied to the Jenkin[?] ones.
Ever affectionately yours | Jos. D. Hooker [signature]
Lady Hooker*11 thanks you very much for your letters, which gave her great pleasure & joins me in best wishes for the New Year.
I am reading Galton's*12 Life -- it is very curious & interesting.

ENDNOTES


1a. A hand written annotation records that the letter was 'an[swere]d 2.i.09'. The letter also has 'TELEGRAMS WINDLESHAM' printed on the top left hand corner.
1. Sir William 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 also married Hooker's eldest daughter Harriet in 1877.
2. Harriet Anne Thiselton-Dyer née Hooker (1854--1945). Oldest child of Joseph Hooker and his first wife Frances. Botanical illustrator and wife of William Thiselton-Dyer.
3. The text 'excuse this blundering' is written vertically along the left margin next to this struck-through text.
4. Oswald Heer (1809--1883). Swiss geologist and naturalist.
5. Edward Forbes, (1815---1854). Manx naturalist.
6. Otto Stapf (1857--1933). Austrian botanist and taxonomist, the son of Joseph Stapf, who worked in the Hallstatt salt-mines. He published the archaeological plant remains from the Late Bronze and Iron Age mines that had been uncovered by his father. Stapf moved to Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew in 1890. He was keeper of the Herbarium from 1909 to 1920 and became British citizen in 1905. He was awarded the Linnean Medal in 1927. In 1908 he was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society.
7. Dr. Thomas Archibald Sprague (1877-1958). Scottish botanist.
8. Andrew Thomas Gage (1871--1945). Scottish botanist and surgeon in the Indian Medical Service.
9. Isaac Henry Burkill (1870--1965). English botanist, Assistant in the Herbarium at Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, later Director of the Botanic Gardens, Singapore.
10. Alfred Barton Rendle (1865--1938). English botanist, Keeper of Botany at the Natural History Museum from 1906--1930.
10. Henry Frederick Conrad Sander (1847--1920). German-born orchidologist and nurseryman.
11. Hyacinth, Lady Hooker, (1842--1921), widow of Sir William Jardine, second wife of Joseph Dalton Hooker.
12. Francis Galton (1822--1911). English anthropologist, scientist, inventor and explorer.

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