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JONATHAN STOKES AND HIS COMMENTARIES. 

 By James Britten, F.L.S., and G. S. Boulger, F.L.S. 



It would be interesting to know more than we do of Dr. 

 Jonathan Stokes, the editor of the second edition of Withoring's 

 Botanical Arrangement. The fullest account of him that has yet 

 appeared is that by Mr. Bagnall in his Flora of StaffordsJiirc.'''- 

 From this we learn that Stokes was born at Chesterfield, Derby- 

 shire, in 1755. He was thus fourteen years junior to Withering 

 and to the younger Linnaous, four years older than James Edward 

 Smith, and six years older than Richard Anthony Salisbury. He 

 graduated as M.D. at Edinburgh in 1782, and was thus, like 

 Pulteney, Withering, Smith and Rutherford, a pupil of John 

 Hope (1725-1786), who was the first to teach the Linnean 

 system in Scotland. Smith was probably his contemporary as an 

 undergraduate ; and he probably, like Smith, made the acquaint- 

 ance of Broussonet at Edinburgh in the year in which he 

 graduated. If he ever actually met the younger Linnaeus (1741- 

 1783), of whom he writes as his friend, it must apparently have 

 been between May and August, 1781, when the Swede was staying 

 with Banks in Soho Square. That Stokes was in London sihout 

 this time is apparent from his own note {Commentaries, cxv.) 

 that he drew up a catalogue of the garden of John Fothergill at 

 the request of the executors, Fothergill having died on December 

 20th, 1780, and the plants being sold by auction on August 20th, 

 1781. Writing to congratulate Smith " on being the possessor 

 of the cabinet and MSS. of the great Linnaeus and of his excellent 

 and amiable son, whose loss I shall ever most sincerely regret as 

 a friend as well as a lover of natural history," he signs himself 

 " Your old fellow-student," and asks for the return of a letter of 

 his " to young Linne." f 



Stokes was also personally acquainted with L'H6ritier, who 

 sent him specimens for his herbarium: he writes: " L'Heritier 

 and Broussonet I much esteem, and I remember with pleasure 

 the civilities I received from several other naturalists of that 

 nation." 



It would appear from references in the Commentaries that 

 Stokes visited France, Holland, Germany and Austria, in which 

 countries he speaks of having "gathered " plants. He apparently 

 practised first at Stourbridge, Worcestershire, from which place 

 the letter just quoted, in which he ofi'ers to buy any duplicates of 

 British or European plants in the Linnean herbarium, is dated ; 

 and there too he seems to have married in 1784. His bride, a 

 Miss Rogers of Dronfield, Derbyshire, was an intimate friend of 

 Anna Seward, " the Swan of Lichfield," and had herself 

 written poetry. | 



* Journal of Botany, 1901, Supplement, p. 70. 



t Correspondence of J. E. Smith, i. 119-121, where are three letters from 

 Stokes. 



\ Letters of Anna Seward (1811) vol. i. p. 167, ii. 61. Among these letters 

 sixteen are addressed by Miss Seward to Mrs, Stokes. 



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