304 Linnean Society. [May 24, 



time by what can only be considered a poor substitute for an anni- 

 versary address ; yet I cannot conclude without adverting, which I 

 do with the greatest satisfaction, to an event of recent occurrence 

 which must prove of the utmost interest and advantage to botanists, 

 — I allude to the transmission to Kew of the splendid herbaria and 

 library of Mr. Bentham, and their unreserved donation to the country. 

 It is, I believe, about forty years since this collection was com- 

 menced, and it would be impertinent in me to pretend to appreciate 

 the value of forty years' labour of such a man as Mr. Bentham ; 

 but I am assured by those who are well acquainted with this collec- 

 tion, and are fully competent to its appreciation, that its value and 

 importance can scarcely be overrated. In this place it would be a 

 work of supererogation, and in me it would be highly presumptuous, 

 to dwell upon the merits of Mr. Bentham as one of the first of exist- 

 ing botanists ; — as one, in fact, who adds to an almost unexampled 

 systematic knowledge of plants, a profound acquaintance with their 

 structure and affinities. I will only add, that the circumstance of 

 Mr. Bentham's having taken up his residence at Kew, is an event 

 that must be most gratifying to the botanists of this country ; and 

 especially as his magnificent donation, to which I have alluded, will, 

 I understand, be made fully available to their use. I cannot oflFer a 

 more propitious and grateful close to my address, than this record of 

 an act of munificent generosity, such as is rarely indeed witnessed 

 during the life of the donor. 



The Secretary then read the following notices of those Members 

 with whose decease the Society had become acquainted since the last 

 Anniversary. 



Arthur Aikin, Esq., was born at Warrington in Lancashire on 

 the 19th of May, 1773. He was the eldest son of John Aikin, M.D., 

 long and honourably distinguished in the world of letters ; and the 

 grandson of John Aikin, D.D., eminent for his learning and abilities, 

 Divinity Tutor of Warrington Academy, then the institution for 

 higher instruction in most repute among the Presbyterian Dissenters. 

 The celebrated Mrs. Barbauld was his aunt. In Arthur, the family 

 vocation declared itself from infancy : in his seventh year his father 

 entered him at the excellent free-school of his native town, where 

 he made a rapid progress, and the start thus gained was never lost. 

 He derived from his father, together with an ardent love of litera- 

 ture, ancient a^ modern, a taste for zoology, for English botany, 

 and for chemistry ; and a visit at the age of 1 2, in the house of Dr. 

 Priestley, then pursuing at Birmingham his brilliant course of che- 



