76 THE JOURNAL OP BOTANY 



account wrote in Dutch. There are also a few bundles of family 

 Papers. The second Box contains a very full and large Book, in 

 which are arranged upwards of 400 drawings of Natural History, 

 appropriate to the Charts and Views. 



" The Charts and Natural History Mrs. Gordon informs me 

 were all designed by her own husband, who drew every outline, 

 and had them finished under his own eye. As her wish is to have 

 these Charts, &c., inspected by such persons as may be deemed 

 adequate to judge of their consequence to this kingdon, she desires 

 me to request in her name the indulgence of their being permitted 

 to be withdrawn from the Custom house, where they are now 

 lodged, without being subject to the duty. 



" I beg leave to apologize for the part I have taken in this 

 business, to which I am alone prompted by the respect I bear to 

 the memory of her deceased husband, and her situation as a 

 stranger in this Country, from whence it is her intention to 

 depart with her family for her native Country, Switzerland, the 

 instant her business is finished. — I have the honour to be most 

 respectfully, 



" Sir, Your most obedient, 



" humble servant, 



" Philip Gidley King." 



From this it is clear that Banks knew of the collection and 

 had some thoughts of obtaining it. Whether it actually reached 

 him I do not know ; but it may be noted that in the Banksian 

 collection of Masson's drawings (see Journ. Bot. 1884, 144; 1885, 

 227) are two — Hoodia Gordoni and Pachypodmm naviaqiianum — 

 which are labelled " Webber " in Dryander's hand, the latter being 

 noted by him as "copied from a drawing of Captain Gordon's at 

 the Cape of Good Hope"; it may however well be that this 

 information was supplied to Dryander by Masson. This drawing 

 is reproduced in Lieut. William Paterson's Narrative of Four Jour- 

 neys into the Country of the Hottentots and Cajfraria (1789) : it 

 seems likely that the other figures of plants in the volume are from 

 the drawings of Gordon, who accompanied Paterson on his jour- 

 neys in 1777 and 1779, and to whom the latter frequently refers. 

 Masson (StapelicB, viii.) mentions both Gordon and Paterson — 

 who in his book always spells his name " Mason " — as having 

 "discovered some very remarkable species of Stapelia" ; his 

 description and figure of S. {Hoodia) Gordoni are taken from the 

 drawing referred to above. 



According to the Maggs Catalogue, " Colonel Eobert Jacob 

 Gordon was a Dutchman of Scottish extraction, born in Guelder- 

 land in 1741. He was in command of the Dutch forces at the 

 Cape, and it is said that when the English took the Colony in 

 1795 he shot himself in chagrin at the failure of his resistance to 

 our arms." Paterson (L c. 113), under date August 1779, gives an 

 account of his naming of the Orange Eiver in honour of the 

 Prince of Orange, which however [l. c. 61) he seems to have done 

 previously in 1777. Incidentally, it would appear that it was 



