492 eicker: botanical activity in district of Columbia 



consisting of Dr. John A. Brereton, Alexander Mc Williams, 

 William Mechlin, William Rich, and Dr. James W. Robbins, the 

 latter removing from the District the next year. In 1830 Dr. 

 Brereton published under the title Florae Coluinhianae pro- 

 dromus, a contribution listing 860 species of plants with date of 

 flowering and root habit indicated. Mr, George Watterson, 

 who had served as Secretary of the first Botanical Society, evi- 

 dently felt that its workers had not been given proper credit 

 for their part of the work, as in his papers at the Library of 

 Congress there is one which had evidently been prepared for 

 publication in which he states that Dr. Brereton was lame and 

 unable to do any of the collecting but' took charge of the speci- 

 mens as they were brought in and occasionally ascertained their 

 names. He also states that Brereton's work contained few if 

 any more plants than were recorded in the journal of the Bo- 

 tanical Society. According to Prof. L. F. Ward,^" this journal 

 contained the names of only 370 plants. 



The first Botanical Society passed a resolution on September 

 12, 1817, petitioning Congress to pass a law authorizing a lot- 

 tery for the purpose of establishing a Botanical Garden in Wash- 

 ington under the superintendence of the Society, but the peti- 

 tion was without results. According to Dr. Richard Rathbun,^i 

 the Columbian Institute had received permission from Congress 

 on May 8, 1820, to use five acres of land to establish a Botani- 

 cal Garden, This was finally located between First and Third 

 streets and Pennsylvania and Maryland' avenues. Mr. W. B. 

 Bryan states^^ that as the waters of the Tiber probably came 

 nearly up to that level the ground was somewhat swampy and 

 first had to be drained. On May 26, 1824, the grounds were 

 extended and in 1825 they were inclosed. There seems to be 

 no record of what improvements or plantings were made by the 

 Columbian Institute, which went out of existence about 1836, 



^° See CoviLLE, Frederick V. Early botanical activity in the District of Co- 

 lumbia. Rec. Columb. Hist. Soc. 5: 193. 1901. 



11 Bull. U. S. Nat. Mus. 101: 12. 1917. 



1' Bryan, Wilhelmus B. A history of the National Capital 1:314. 1914; 

 2:29,326. 1916. 



