MR. JOHN GILBERT BAKER 



43 



Joseph was at that time a stranger to me, and his communication 

 came as a complete surprise. I need hardly say how thankfully I 

 accepted his offer. That was the beginning of a long connection 

 with the Gardens that has been to me a source of continual 

 delight. Evenually, as you are probably aware, I succeeded 

 Professor Oliver as Keeper. I had the privilege of assisting Sir 

 Joseph Hooker with some of his scientific books. Sir Joseph was 

 a man of unbounded energy, and, in my opinion, one of the 

 greatest men of science who ever lived. He had been a great 

 traveller, visiting the Antarctic region among other parts of the 

 world in pursuit of his favourite studies. His father. Sir William, 

 was of a more stay-at-home disposition, but he did great things 

 for the Gardens, which, when he first went there, were in a state 

 of absolute chaos. It had been a private garden of the Koyal 

 Family, and in the reigns of George IV. and William IV. had been 

 greatly neglected. Sir William built three great houses, estab- 

 lished communication with all the botanic gardens in the world, 

 brought from Glasgow his herbarium and library, and, in short, 

 made the place for the first time a thoroughly scientific institution. 

 The good work has been well carried on by his successors, Sir 

 Joseph Hooker, Sir W. Thiselton Dyer, and Sir David Prain. 

 During Sir David Prain's comparatively short tenure of office he 

 has built a beautiful series of tanks for hardy water-plants and 

 bog and marsh plants, and has done a lot to the Rockery, while 

 altering the walks in such a way as to give easier access to the 

 temperate house and other points of interest. Sir William 

 Hooker planned out a vast scheme under which all the plants of 

 the British Dominions and dependencies, 50,000 in number, are 

 to be made into a list. That scheme began with Australia, and 

 is not yet finished, although the end is now in sight. The 

 magnitude of the undertaking may be judged from the fact that 

 in India alone there are 13,000 plants, more than are to be found 

 in the whole of Europe. The fact is that in India you have a 

 sort of variation in climatic conditions, from perpetual snow to 

 extreme tropical heat. Africa is still to a large extent an un- 

 explored region from the point of view of the botanist. The 

 flora of the Cape has been completed, and in it are the names of 

 10,000 plants. In tropical Africa scarcely a day passes but a new 

 plant is discovered. Mrs. Talbot has recently made a collection 

 in Nigeria, which totals 10,000 genera and 200,000 species. Of 

 these 15 of the former are new^ as are 150 of the latter. 



" The science of botany, I need hardly say, is a very different 

 thing from what it was when I began my studies. Linnaeus is 

 quite out of date, although his system is still useful as a sort of 

 index to plants, but in his day only about 10,000 plants were 

 known in the entire world. The system of Linnaeus is what is 

 called the artificial system, and it was superseded by that of 

 Jussieu, which is the natural system. The difference between 

 the two would be best described by saying that that of Linnaeus 

 was a dictionary in which the different plants are given in alpha- 

 betical order, while that of Jussieu is a grammar in which they 



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