298 MEMOIR OF 
It would also be a very valuable document, 
inasmuch as it would shew that many of these 
persons have not been more remarkable for the 
extent and accuracy of their knowledge, than for 
their quiet and inoffensive lives, and for a strict 
attention to those domestic duties upon which the 
comfort and happiness of all classes of society so 
much depend. 
I believe it was the intention of Mr. Edwin 
Serjeant, had his life been spared, to have fur- 
nished the public with the most interesting parti- 
culars of Hobson’s life, and, from their long 
intimacy, it is to be regretted that he was not able 
to accomplish it. 
The papers and letters which he had collected 
for this purpose having been placed in my hands, 
I have been induced, as a tribute of respect to 
both these amiable friends, to lay before the 
society the following brief memoir of one of the 
most ardent admirers of Natural History, and 
accurate investigators of difficult Botany, which 
this country has produced. 
Edward Hobson, the author of Musci Britan- 
nici, &c., was born in Ancoats Lane, Manchester, 
