132 SIR WILLIAM HOOKER 



him, though many won't believe him." I can hardly doubt that 

 physiology of plants will also have figured in the course, first 

 because Sir William was himself a successful gardener, but 

 secondly because we have in the Botanical Department in 

 Glasgow the syllabus of the lectures of Professor Hamilton who 

 taught botany in the University in the latter end of the i8th 

 century. In this course physiology took a surprisingly large 

 place, and we can hardly believe that it would have dropped out 

 of Sir William's course altogether. But of this there is no 

 definite record. 



Another feature of the teaching of Sir William was the 

 practical illustration of botany in the field, by means of ex- 

 cursions. Of these Sir Joseph tells us there were habitually 

 three in each summer session, two of them on Saturdays, to 

 favourable points in the neighbourhood of Glasgow; but the 

 third, which took place about the end of June, was a larger 

 undertaking. With a party of some thirty students, and occa- 

 sional scientific visitors from elsewhere, he started for the 

 Western Highlands, usually the Breadalbane range. In those 

 days, before railways, and often with indifferent roads, this was 

 no light affair, and in some cases it involved camping. I do not 

 know whether this was the beginning of those class excursions 

 which have been so marked a feature in the botanical work of 

 the Scottish Universities, but it is to be remembered that his 

 immediate successor in the Glasgow chair was Dr Hutton 

 Balfour, who in later years confirmed and extended the practice, 

 and it has been kept up continuously in the Scottish universities 

 ever since. It was to meet the requirements of such work in 

 the field that Sir William prepared and published the Flora 

 Scotica. The first edition appeared before his second year's 

 class had assembled in 1821. The first Part related to the 

 Phanerogams only, arranged according to the Linnaean system. 

 The second, which seems to have been almost as much a new 

 book as a second edition, contained the Phanerogams arranged 

 according to the natural system, just then coming into general use. 

 It also embodied the Cryptogams, in the working up of which he 

 had the assistance of Lindley and of Greville. The total number 

 of species described was 1784, of which 902 were Cryptogams. 



