MAUIS'D's " THE BOTANIST " 239 



the Dictionary were at first attached to the numbers of the Botanist, 

 but wei'e subsequently detached, though issued with it. A fvirther 

 supplement, compi-ehensive in its nature, was projected by Maund in 

 the shape of " a Table which shall exhibit Science at sight " : this is 

 announced on the Avrapper of no. 23, but never appeared. Besides 

 the foi-egoing there was issued at the end of each year a Swpplement 

 (so named) containing two plates (thus bringing the number in each 

 volume up to 50) with descriptions, as well as index and titlepage. 

 The Supplement for 1837 (tt. 49, 50) was not published until May 

 1838, in consequence of delay arising in connection with the orna- 

 mental steel-plate title-page which, as well as the title-page proper, 

 accompanied each volume. 



III. The Condttctob. 



Of the early life of Benjamin Maund the " conductor " and pro- 

 prietor of these magazines, nothing seems to be known. The obituary 

 notice in the Proceedings of the Linnean Society (1863-4, xxxii.), 

 from which the account in Diet. Xat. Biogr. (xxxvii. 91) is largely 

 derived, gives the date of his birth as 1790, but has nothing further 

 to say about him until " he carried on the combined business of a 

 chemist, bookseller, printer, and publisher at Bromsgrove in Worcester- 

 shire." Although styled (D. N. B. I. c.) a " botanical Avriter," he 

 had small claims to such a description, though two short notes in the 

 Phytoloyist (i. 15 ; 1844) indicate that he was interested in the 

 plants of his neighbourhood ; he also served (1835-42) on the botani- 

 cal committee of the Worcestershire Natural History Society. He 

 is not mentioned in Edwin Lees's Botany of Worcestershire (18G7) 

 nor in Amphlett and Eea's work with the same title (1909) in which 

 neither of the notes above mentioned is referred to ; but his name 

 occurs twice in the (anonymous) botanical appendix contributed by 

 Edwin Lees to Hastings's lUiistrations of the Natural History of 

 Worceste7'shire (1834). 



In 1825 Maund began to publish The Botanic Garden, which he 

 carried on with success for a quarter of a century, and which may 

 form the subject of a separate note. Its favourable reception induced 

 him to project the serial now under consideration, which, while 

 resembling the Botanic Garden in format, should differ from it in 

 important particulars, and would indeed appeal to a somewhat more 

 scientific class of readers. The programme as set forth on the 

 wrapper of the first number is sufficiently ambitious, but the antici- 

 pations raised were on the whole justified, though it is not easy to 

 see its " first importance to persons going abroad, as it will enable the 

 traveller to refer any unknown plant to its natural order." The 

 plan and execution of the work show that Maund was fully com- 

 petent to select as fellow-workers men who possessed the scientific 

 knowledge which he himself lacked ; the letterpress throughout is of 

 a high order and far more comprehensive and informing than that 

 of any of its contemporaries. The Botanic Garden had shown 

 Maund's ability to supply cultural and general information in an 

 acceptable wa}', and this he continued to do in The Botanist. 



