T. A. Knight, Sir Joseph Banks 241 



found time to contribute a number of papers to the Philo- 

 sophical Transactions. 



On the death of Sir Isaac Newton he followed him as 

 President of the Royal Society, and occupied the chair for 

 twenty-eight years, until 1740. Perhaps his greatest con- 

 tribution to botany was in connexion with the Physic 

 Garden of Chelsea. He had purchased the manor of that 

 village in 1712, and on retiring from practice settled on his 

 estate. This included the site of a " Physic " garden estab- 

 lished, in 1673, by the Apothecaries' Society, and Sloane 

 handed, in 1722, the fee simple of the property to that body, 

 subject to certain conditions. His name is commemorated 

 on the Cadogan Estate in the West End of London by Sloane 

 Square and Hans Place. 



A second explorer, " the greatest Englishman of his time," 

 traveller and prominent collector, was Sir Joseph Banks 

 (1743-1820), who was educated both at Harrow and Eton. 

 At school he was so immoderately fond of play that his 

 masters found great difficulty in fixing his attention on his 

 studies, but at the age of fourteen, impressed by the beauties 

 of flowers in the country lanes, he decided to study botany, 

 and probably his real education was largely due to the women 

 who were then, as they are now, collecting " simples " for 

 druggists' shops. At Oxford, where he found no lectures were 

 being delivered on his favourite subject, he obtained per- 

 mission to procure a teacher to be paid by the students, and 

 coming over to Cambridge he brought back with him to his own 

 university Israel Lyons, the astronomer and botanist. I wonder 

 if any student has ever attempted such an enterprise since ! 



Banks was a wealthy man and was able to indulge 

 his passion for travelling. His first journey was to New- 

 foundland, and after his return, via Lisbon, he came across 

 Dr. Daniel Solander, the faithful pupil of Linnaeus, who 

 subsequently accompanied him in his voyage round the 

 world, for Banks left England in August 1768 on Captain 

 Cook's Endeavour. The scientific part of the expedition was 

 financed by Banks, and he was accompanied not only by 

 Dr. Solander but by two artists and two attendants. It 

 would take too much space to dwell upon that remarkable 

 voyage, Banks was collecting not only plants, but animals, 



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