192 EDINBURGH 



for a Botanist to obtain a situation altogether agreeable to him, 

 and that will afford him means of support.' Sir William 

 might have said this with equal truth of any branch of science, 

 and not at that time only. 



At the same time Hooker fully realised the importance of 

 completing his magnum opus. The arrangements for its pub- 

 lication in parts, month after month, rendered it impossible 

 to carry out the scheme anywhere but at Kew. * The value 

 of my library and Herbarium/ writes Sir William, ' was never 

 more fully evinced than in his preparation for his work. The 

 British Museum, though invaluable in some respects, does not 

 afford him a tythe of the information that my collections 

 do.' With his usual generosity, Sir William hoped to make 

 over the Herbarium to his son once he was established in 

 Edinburgh, when it could be kept either at the Garden or in 

 the College. 



As it soon appeared, there was no question of payment for 

 this course of lectures. Professor Graham had just suffered 

 severe money losses, and was fatally ill. Indeed his increasing 

 weakness prevented him from helping at all in the lecturing 

 as he first hoped ; and although he offered rooms at his own 

 house, the good prospect of the succession to the professorship 

 was regarded by the Hookers as sufficient material reward. To 

 undertake the temporary course was both to make a trial of 

 lecturing and to do his old friend a service, ' and I think,' writes 

 his father, ' that alone will go a great way with Joseph.' 



After Professor Graham's death, however, when his affairs 

 had been wound up, Mrs. Graham wrote begging him to accept 

 100 for his great services. Hooker writes to Dawson Turner 

 (April 25, 1846) : 



She says it was only a portion of what her husband would 

 have done, and entreats me to accept it if only to gratify 

 her and all the rest of it, in such a strain as you can well 

 understand without my repeating. I believe that no one 

 could be more grateful for real services on my part than Mrs. 

 Graham is for supposed ones. But if she would not add 

 these testimonies of the sincerity of her regard, I should be 

 much better pleased. To have felt as I did, that I had the 



