356 THE JOUllNAL Of BOTANY 



necessarily slow the labour and fatigue were very great. Still, as lie 

 said, the work had to be done, and there was no one to do it but 

 himself. The result is one of the best county Floras ever published, 

 and a book which will endure for many years ; a proof of this is seen in 

 the second-hand booksellers' catalogues, where it still maintains its 

 price — a fate much to be envied by some more recently-published 

 Floras of Midland counties. 



Bao-nall devoted much of his time to the Koses and Brambles ; he 

 was recognized as an authority upon these groups, and published in 

 this Journal for 1882 an account of the Rubi found in the county. 

 At a later time, after many other contributions, including The 

 Mosses and Hepatics of StaffordsJiire (1896), he compiled also a 

 Flora of Stajfordshh'e which appeared in the Journal of Hotany as a 

 supplement during 1901, and Avas reissued in pamphlet form. But 

 he was now losing his vigour and was no longer capable of such 

 heroic walks ; this jiublication, therefore, inevitably falls a long 

 way below the level of his previous work. During all these years he 

 collected flowering plants, ferns, and mosses with great assiduity, and 

 accumulated a large herbarium which passed some j^ears ago into the 

 iDOSsession of his native town. His latter years from 1901 were 

 passed in quiet rest, on an annuity which he had bought with his 

 savings ; but during the whole time of his activity his working-days 

 were spent in an office during the week, and he had nothing but the 

 scanty leisure of week-ends (and they were ^i^ok-ends in those days) 

 to give to his favourite hobby. That he accomplished so much was 

 due entirely to his single-minded devotion to it. 



All those who came into contact with him, especially working- 

 men with a taste for natural history, knew how ready he was to help, 

 and many a tale was told among his acquaintance of his intense 

 sympathy and kindness towards beginners. Among other things he 

 often gave lessons to such students, but would never take any reward 

 for his labours. There was scarcely any branch of inland systematic 

 botany in which he was not proficient, except the Lichens ; and those 

 who know the peculiarly repellent kind of text-book then available on 

 that topic will not be surprised at the omission. In politics he was 

 a strong conservative, with a marked distaste for modern democratic 

 notions ; he was also a man of high ideals, with a great respect for 

 religion. 



Bagnall died at Aston on the third of September at the ripe age 

 of nearly 88 ; during his last years he became dependent upon his faith- 

 ful housekeeper — he was never married — and practically disappeared 

 from scientific circles in the town, but his name will always stand 

 out in the memory of those who knew him as that of an unassuming 

 but vieorous and interesting personality, and the very type of those 

 members who composed the Birmingham Natural History Society 

 during its best and most palmy times. A portrait of him forms the 

 frontispiece of a little sketch of his botanical work by his friend 

 Mr. E. W. Badger, printed for private circulation at Birmingham in 

 1897. W. B. G. 



