306 THE KEY. M. J. BERKELEY, M.A., F.R.S. 



most mycologists he never surpassed his first great work on Fungi 

 — nor have any who have come after him. The * Notices of British 

 Fungi' were begun in 1837, in the 'Magazine of Zoology and 

 Botany ' (the forerunner of the ' Annals and Magazine of Natural 

 History'), and these appeared at intervals, the late Mr. Broome 

 joining in tlie authorship in 1848. 



During the progress of the ' Notices,' Berkeley produced a series 

 of papers describing collections of Fungi from many quarters of the 

 world. The Fungi collected during the voyage of the ' Beagle ' by 

 Mr. Darwin, the novelties of the Hookerian Herbarium and of the 

 British Museum, the Philippine collections of Cuming, and many 

 others may be cited. In short, he was the standing authority to 

 whom every one appealed on mycological matters, and whose office 

 it seemed to be to describe the Fungi of every collector of note 

 during a period of unequalled activity in botanical exploration by 

 travellers from this country. 



Between 1844 and 1856 he issued his well known ' Decades of 

 Fungi.' His correspondence with Mr. Broome appears to have 

 begun in 1811, the date of the first letter from Berkeley in the long 

 series bequeathed by Mr. Broome to the British Museum. The 

 letter deals mainly with Mr. Broome's enquiries about Cunferva 

 <j lame rata, and a mould which Berkeley tells him is probably 

 Gonatohutnjs simplex Corda, of which a sketch is given. In the 

 very next letter Berkeley asks Broome about truffles, and hence- 

 forth Broome takes them up ; and much of the immediately ensuing 

 correspondence relates to his " finds." As is well known, Tuberacete 

 remained Broome's favourite Fungi throughout life. The books and 

 scientific papers of Berkeley have sufficed to place him far above his 

 fellow-mycologists in this country, but a casual perusal of his 

 correspondence with Broome impresses one somehow even more. 

 There is hardly a letter in these volumes of them which does not 

 speak of observations, many of them as important for their time as 

 the bulk of the results often set forth nowadays with all the circum- 

 stance of costly illustrations in the form of scientific papers. His 

 industry was unwearied in the study of Fungi, and at the same time 

 he had his clerical duties to perform ; for a time, too, those of a 

 schoolmaster in addition, and always more or less of work for 

 publishers and others, to add to his income. 



Thirty years ago, and more, he began to suffer much from a 

 variety of minor complaints, and while he held the posts of Examiner 

 at London University and of Scientific Adviser to the Horticultural 

 Society it was often with a struggle that he succeeded in keeping 

 his engagements. But, with it all, there is never a word of his 

 courage failing, and no sign of slackening of his marvellous activity 

 in research. Nothing could give one a more happy idea of Berkeley's 

 character than some of these letters telling of his son Emeric's 

 going to India, and his rejoicing over the arrival of specimens from 

 him, notably Emericella, of which he gives a drawing in his letter 

 to Broome — a type puzzling still, even after Mr. Massee's minute 

 examination of it. Mr. Broome was joint author with Berkeley of 

 the 'Notices of British Fungi' after 1848, and of memoirs on Ceylon 

 Fungi and on Australian Fungi. 



