318 RETIREMENT, TO 1897 : DAEWINIANA, ETC. 



as to the Natural History &c. of their own country was to be 

 had for the listening, and the leaders would be marked men. 



J. H. 



To the Same 



Oct. 26, 1888. 



The great thing will be to lead the Club back to definite 

 work with a definite object, and if you succeed in this it will 

 be an achievement. But even then a difficulty remains, 

 and that is to induce the workers to put up their work into 

 shape for publication ; however it is a case of ' nothing 

 venture, nothing win. , 



A scheme of reform was proposed, and later bore good 

 fruit. It was a curious coincidence that by almost the same 

 post Hooker received a similar communication from New 

 Zealand as to maintaining a Natural History Club. 



In 1892 he was asked, with Lady Hooker, to preside at a 

 meeting of the Club, to give a short address and see for himself 

 the betterment of local effort. But though he went as a guest 

 and greatly enjoyed the excursion, he refused speech and 

 presidency, not only because with the Flora of British India to 

 finish, he had abjured all lectures and addresses, but because, 

 in his opinion, 



the plan of asking outsiders of position to take the 

 leadership of such exceptional provincial scientific meetings 

 is a mistake. These meetings afford the opportunities for the 

 members of bringing forward their own provincial scientific 

 magnates, whom they should then show they honour, by 

 putting them forward. 



The same principle is insisted on in the following letters. 

 Shrewsbury was erecting a memorial statue to Charles Darwin. 



The Camp, Sunningdale : March 4, 1894. 



My dear La Touche, — Anent the Darwin Memorial for 

 Shrewsbury, I feel sure that the best plan by far is to have 

 a copy of the statue in the Nat. Hist. Museum, and it ought 

 to be at the expense of the Salopians themselves. The 

 general public contributed most liberally, the scientific men 



