312 SIR JOSEPH DALTON HOOKER 



the known facts that could be gathered were incorporated, so 

 that they became systematically elaborated and complete Floras 

 of the several countries. Moreover, in the last of them, the 

 Flora Tasmaniae, there is an Introductory Essay, which in itself 

 would have made Hooker famous. We shall return to this later. 

 Meanwhile we recognise that the publication of the Botanical 

 Results of Ross's Voyage established Hooker's reputation as a 

 Traveller and Botanist of the first rank. 



What he did for the Antarctic in his youth he continued 

 in mature life for British India. While the publication of the 

 Antarctic Flora was still in progress, he made his Indian 

 journeys. The vast collections amassed by himself and Dr 

 Thomson were consigned by agreement with Government to 

 Kew. Thither had also been brought in 1858 "seven waggon- 

 loads of collections from the cellars of the India House in 

 Leadenhall Street, where they had been accumulating for many 

 years." They included the herbaria of Falconer and Griffith. 

 Such materials, with other large additions made from time to 

 time, flowed into the already rich Herbarium at Kew. This was 

 the material upon which Sir Joseph Hooker was to base his 

 Magnum Opus, the Flora of BritisJi India. 



Already in 1855 Sir Joseph, with his Glasgow college friend, 

 Thomas Thomson, had essayed to prepare a " Flora Indica." 

 It never advanced beyond its first volume. But if it had been 

 completed on the scale set by that volume, it would have reached 

 nearly 12,000 pages ! After a pause of over fifteen years Hooker 

 made a fresh start, aided now by a staff of collaborators, and the 

 Flora of British India was the result. It was conceived, he says 

 with regret, upon a restricted plan. Nevertheless it ran to seven 

 volumes, published between the years 1872 and 1897. There 

 are nearly 6000 pages of letterpress, relating to 16,000 species. 

 It is, he says in the Preface, a pioneer work, and necessarily in- 

 complete. But he hopes it may " help the phytographer to 

 discuss problems of distribution of plants from the point of view 

 of what is perhaps the richest, and is certainly the most varied 

 botanical area on the surface of the globe." 



Scarcely was this great work ended when Dr Trimen died. He 

 left the Ceylon Flora, on which he had been engaged, incomplete. 



