1913- Lett. — Botaiiists of the North of Iniaiid. 25 
it asked ; — " Mr. Bishop, how is it that my gardener tells me 
that the worst weed he has to contend with is ' Bishop's 
Weed ' ? " " And " replied Dr. Mant— " My gardener says 
the most troublesome weed in my garden is called ' Elder- 
weed ' " ! 
The Very Rev. Holt Waring, born 1766 and died 1850, 
who was rector of Shankill and Lurgan, and Dean of 
Dromore, had a most delightful garden at his residence, 
Waringstown House, close to the village of the same name 
in Co. Down. There was in it a choice collection of rare 
trees and shrubs, and hardy foreign as well as native plants, 
and there was also a fine rock-garden in one part of it, 
with a large collection of hardy Ferns, and a pond for 
choice aquatics. A peculiarity of the whole was that every 
plant had a legible label with the proper scientific name. 
I saw it sixty-five years ago w^hen it was in its perfection ; 
it was my first introduction to a good collection of Ferns, 
and till quite recently I never saw a better. This garden 
flourished till the end of the last century. 
There was a family named Hancock, long resident in 
Lisburn, one of whom, Dr. Thomas Hancock, born in that 
town in 1783, was a botanist and skilful physician, who 
eventually settled in London. 
George Dickie, born in Aberdeen in 18 12, became Pro- 
fessor of Natural Histor}/^ at Belfast in 1849. He returned 
to his native city in i860 as Professor of Botany in Aberdeen 
University, and in 1864 he published his well-known and 
useful little " Flora of Ulster," where his botanical field work 
in the North of Ireland is fully recorded. A short bio- 
graphy of him appears in the " Flora of the North-east of 
Ireland." 
Rev. William Hind, a member of a well-known Belfast 
famil}^ born in Belfast 1815, died in Suffolk 1894, was curate 
of Derryaghy, Co. Antrim, in 1839. His herbarium of 
British plants is in the herbarium of Trinit}/ College, 
Dublin. 
Professor Ralph Tate, F.L.S., born at Alnwick, Northum- 
berland, and died in 1901 at Adelaide, vSouth Australia. 
Author of " Flora Belfastiensis," published in 1863, which 
gives the results of his investigations of the plants in Down 
