Obituary JVotice. 157 



ought to take into account some of the good he had done. The meeting 

 spurned the unmanly proposal, and the motion was altogether with- 

 drawn. Mr. Sabine's errors in the society were errors only because 

 they were not carried out; and whatever people may say of that moun- 

 tebank concern now, with Lindley dancing the tight rope, Dr. Hender- 

 son playing clown, Mr. Gower pautaloon, and the two ladies performing 

 columbine, one fact is certain, either that the Horticultural Society 

 ought to have been carried through upon the liberal scale on whichit 

 was planned, or it ought not to have been continued at all; and hundreds 

 of the present members regret that so far as all the real purposes of the 

 society — the collecting of exotics — are concerned, it has been useless 

 the last three or four years. Since Mr. Sabine resigned his office in the 

 Horticultural Society, he has devoted much time to the gardens of the 

 Zoological Society, where the dahlia is cultivated in greater variety than 

 ill any public or private garden. Indeed, to this flower had Mr. Sabine 

 become so entirely devoted of late, that he spared no means to learn 

 the origin of every kind, where and by whom it was raised and named, 

 and, if he could, from what seed it came. Among numerous letters 

 and papers in our possession, we shall have ample opportunities of il- 

 lustrating this desire to ascertain the history of every individual variety. 

 Soon after Mr. Sabine's resignation as honorary secretary of the Hor- 

 ticultural Society, Mr. Burke, (seeing, we suppose, that Mr. Sabine 

 had the superintendence of the Zoological Farm at Kingston,) moved 

 that it be given up. On that occasion, Mr. Sabine defended its con- 

 tinuance very earnestly, and silenced all remarks about being interested, 

 by showing he had expended a hundred and fifty pounds of his own 

 money, because he Avould receive no reimbursements; and though very 

 well planned and arranged on the part of the malcontents, an amend- 

 ment for the continuance of the farm was carried by a majority of m'ne. 

 At the last annual meeting of the Zoological Society, Mr. Sabine was 

 one of the council who went out of office by rotation, and he took con- 

 siderable interest in the election, on account of the opposition list, got 

 up among the well trained enemies to the council. After a good deal 

 of barking on that day, the result of the ballot placed the busy-bodies 

 in such a fragment of a minority, that any idea of commanding the re- 

 spect or support of a majority in future must be bordering on the insane. 

 Indeed poor Sabine knew every movement of his mole-like adversaries. 

 The ramifications from Regent Street — Dr. Henderson's industrious 

 perambulations — the honorary secretary's cogitations — and all the 

 secret machinery of the little agitating knot of worthies, were as well 

 understood as if they had all taken place in open daylight, and were as 

 effectually defeated. Upon the whole, few lived more respected by sci- 

 entific men, or more envied by pretenders; few have died who were more 

 missed in the particular circles that they have moved in. For our own 

 parts we shall not, for some time, attend a floral exhibition without 

 recalling him forcibly to our mind; and as many young gardeners owe 

 much to his kindness of heart, so many have lost the benefit of his in- 

 fluence. Mr. Sabine had many marks of distinction on account of his 

 valuable services, the following, in particular, from the Horticultural 

 Society : 



' To Joseph Sabine, Esq., the Honorary Secretary, the Gold Medal, as a token of the 

 liigh sense entertained by the Society of the very great assiduity and intelligence mani- 

 fested h\ him, as well in Uie formation of the by-laws as in the arranging and settling the 

 long and very intricate accounts of tlie Society. — Jjme 4, 1816.' " 



Mr. Sabine was the early patron of the late lamented Douglas, and 

 was the means of his being employed for the Horticultural Society; and 

 it is to him, almost as well as to the latter, that the horticultural commu- 

 nity is so much indebted for the beautiful plants he sent home. — Cond. 



