244 THE JOURNAL OF BOTANY 



T. Thiselton-Dyer and the Editor of this Journal. In the meetings 

 and Saturda}^ afternoon excui-sions of the Soeiet}^ Smith took a 

 prominent part: his first published papers — on J^nphorbia amygda- 

 loides and " On some Dioicious Plants " ( Journ. Bot. 1864, 196, 

 229) were read at its meetings ; I hrst met him about this time 

 at an excursion in the neighbourhood of Finehley, at the period 

 when North London, New Cross, and Clapham Common still offered 

 botanical attractions. The friendship then established was never 

 broken : we corresponded frequently, not only on botanical but on 

 archi«ological and political matters — his letters were often amusing 

 and his criticisms, botanical and othei', incisive. 



Smith's earliest botanical illustrations appeared in The Wild 

 Floivers of Great Britain, by Robert Hogg, which was issued in 

 numbers, each containing four plates with letterpress, between 1861 

 and 1880, and may form the subject of a separate bibliographical 

 note. Begun by Charlotte Grower, the work, to the great gain of 

 the subscribers, was taken up in 1864 and carried on to the end 

 by Smith, who drew and lithographed the plates after t. 144. In 

 1867 he published, under the title Mushrooms and Toadstools, two 

 large sheets of coloured drawings, with accompanying text : the 

 latter was subsequently reissued as a small volume. 



From this date onwards Smith was fiilly employed in botanical and 

 horticultural literary work, both as author and illustrator. In 1868 

 he became a Fellow of the Linnean Society ; in the following year he 

 became associated with The Gardeners^ Chronicle, for which he was 

 for a long period the princijial artist, and in which some of his best 

 Avork appeared. In the same year he took up the illustration, in 

 colour- lithography, of The Floral Magazine ; this he continued until 

 1876. 



In 1869 Smith placed before the Woolhope Club, Hereford (for 

 some account of which see Journ. Bot. 1871, 307), his Clavis Agari- 

 cinorum — "an analytical Key to the British Agaricini, with characters 

 of the genera and subgenera." This was Smith's first important 

 contribution to mycological literature ; it was printed in the Trans- 

 actions of the Club and in this Journal for 1870." It summarized 

 the results of many years' work, both in the field and in the library ; 

 the outlines on the accompanying plates were in every case drawn 

 from nature. Dr. Henry Graves Bull, an enthusiastic mycologist, 

 was then a prominent member of the Club, in connection with which 

 (in 1867) he instituted the now popular " fungus foray " ; he had 

 become acquainted with Smith imder somewhat amusing circum- 

 stances, as narrated by the latter in the notice of Bull contributed to 

 this Journal for 1886 (p. 63) — a good example of Smith's lighter 

 style, of which his notes on C. E. Broome (1899, 398) furnish another 

 instance. In connection with the forays Smith published in The 

 Graj^lic for 1873-5 three very clever and amusing full-page drawings, 

 containing in a decorative setting of Immorous incidents portraits of 

 the more notable of those who took part in them. In later years he 

 designed the menu for the dinner which was held in connection with 

 the forays : no one who is not acquainted with these Jew^r d' esprit asm 



