212 NOTES OF A BOTANIST 



Whatever steps you think necessary to take for 

 lessening your labour in the distribution of my 

 plants will meet my cheerful acquiescence. ... I 

 am deeply thankful to you for having bestowed so 

 much of your valuable time on my plants ; but, on 

 my part, I can truly say that I have had no greater 

 stimulus in collecting than to think, whenever 1 

 have gathered a new or strange plant, " This will 

 surely please Mr. Bentham." 



I wrote to you in June last, on the occasion of 

 dispatching to you three cases of plants from 

 Ambato. . . . 



I am sorry the collection does not contain more 

 trees ; but the number of species of trees is actually 

 much fewer in cold regions than in warm, and I 

 miss much here the excellent climbers (Indians, I 

 mean, not lianas) I used to have on the Uaupes and 

 Rio Negro. However, if I remain in the country, 

 not many of the trees shall escape me. There are 

 a great many arborescent Composite, of which I 

 have as yet taken very few do you think I ought 

 to gather them all ? 



My object in visiting Quito was partly to get 

 my few books bound and a few clothes made, for 

 in so many years in the forest all I had with me 

 had got into a very dilapidated state ; as also to 

 get such substitutes as I could for the warm under- 

 clothing sent out by yourself and Mr. Pritchett and 

 lost on the way. I hope also to herborise a little 

 on the western side of the Cordillera, but I have 

 been seriously ill, and am still in so much pain 

 that I cannot write for more than a few minutes 

 together. 



