1915] 



HILL — BOTANIC GARDENS 201 



Owing to the outbreak of the Civil Wars and the death of 

 the Earl of Danby, in 1644, his intention to provide the Uni- 

 versity with a Professor of Botany as well as with a physic 

 garden and a gardener, was long delayed, and the first profes- 

 sor, in the person of Dr. Robert Morison, was not elected to 

 fill the office until December 16, 1669. Morison 's first lecture 

 was given in the Medicine School on September 2, 1670, and 

 on September 5, he ''translated himself to the Physic Garden 

 where he read in the middle of it (with a Table before him) 

 on herbs and plants for five weeks space, not without a con- 

 siderable Auditory." 1 



Space does not permit us to follow the fortunes of the Ox- 

 ford Garden or to make mention of the many distinguished 

 professors associated with it since its foundation, but it is of 

 interest to remember that Sir Joseph Banks was a student at 

 Christchurch, from 1760 to 1763, in the days of Sibthorp's 

 professorship, a time when no lectures on botany were given 

 and the subject was much neglected in the University. 



Banks was so keenly interested in botany that he applied 

 to Sibthorp for permission to procure a qualified lecturer to 

 be paid entirely by the students. This request being acceded 

 to and a sufficient number of students having been obtained, 

 Banks went to Cambridge and secured the services of a Mr. 

 Lyons, a botanist and astronomer, for the purpose. 2 The 

 assistance rendered by the sister university in the botanical 

 education of one who was to achieve such great things for the 

 science and to have so large a share in directing the fortunes 

 of the Royal Gardens at Kew, is worthy of more particular 

 notice since botany was not officially recognized in Cambridge 

 until 1724, when a professor was appointed, and there was no 

 botanic garden there until the year 1762. 



The Botanic Garden at Edinburgh, which now claims atten- 

 tion, has had a somewhat involved history, as the present 

 Royal Botanic Garden is the sixth and only remaining botanic 

 garden in the Scottish capital, though in the early years of 



1 Vines, S. H., and Druee, G. C. loc. cit., p. XXIV. 



'Anonymous, Sir Joseph Banks and the Royal Society p. 62. London, 1844. 



