DEVELOPMENT OF KEW 141 



richest in the world in both flowering and flowerless plants. 

 Finally after his death it was acquired by purchase for the State 

 in 1866, together with about 1000 volumes from his library, and 

 a unique collection of botanical drawings, maps, MSS., portraits 

 of botanists, and letters from botanical correspondents, which 

 amounted to about 27,000. These were the prime founda- 

 tions of the great herbarium and library now at Kew. Great 

 additions have since been made by purchase and by gift, 

 and the building has been repeatedly extended to receive the 

 growing mass of material. But for all time the character 

 and individuality of the collections will remain stamped by 

 the personality of those two great benefactors, Bentham and 

 the first Hooker. 



Sufficient has now been said to indicate that Hooker's work 

 was that of a pioneer, in providing the material foundation 

 necessary for the further study of the science, not only in this 

 country, but also in the furthest lands of the Empire. He 

 supplied a coordinating centre for botanical organisation in 

 Britain, and for that service he has earned the lasting grati- 

 tude of botanists. It remains to review his own published 

 works, and base upon them some estimate of his more direct 

 influence upon the progress of the science. We shall see that 

 in this also his work was largely of that nature which affords 

 a basis for future development. It was carried out almost 

 entirely under pre-Darwinian conditions. He was pre-eminently 

 a descriptive botanist, who worked under the influence of the 

 current belief in the constancy of species. But his enormous 

 output of accurate description and of delineation of the most 

 varied forms, has provided a sure basis upon which the more 

 modern seeker after phyletic lines may proceed. 



There have been few if any writers on botanical subjects so 

 prolific as Sir William Hooker, and probably none have ever 

 equalled him in the number and accuracy of the plates which 

 illustrated his writings. Sir Joseph Hooker estimates the number 

 of the latter at nearly 8000, of which about 1800 were from 

 drawings executed by himself. The remainder were chiefly from 

 the hand of Walter Fitch, who acted as botanical limner to 

 Sir William for thirty years, showing in the work fidelity, artistic 



