THE ROCKERY 73 



minerals, too, and mysterious fossils, and 

 " curiosities " sailors were bringing from 

 newly-discovered lands. 



Lord Brougham, in a sketch of Banks' 

 character l (endorsed by Sir Joseph Hooker), 

 said : " He showed no jealousy of any rival 

 no prejudice. . . . His house, his library, his 

 whole valuable collection were at all times 

 open to men of science." Sir Joseph Hooker 

 speaks of his " indefatigable exertions " to 

 raise Kew Gardens " to the position of the 

 first in the world." It was through Banks' 

 earnest recommendation, too, that Australia 

 was colonized. 



On Sir Joseph Banks' return from Iceland in 

 1772, a rockery for Alpine plants was made in 

 the Physic Garden, and the very strangest 

 company of rocks that ever came together met 

 in Chelsea. The blocks of lava, which Sir 

 Joseph Banks had dug from the lava beds of 

 Hecla, became the bed-fellows of forty tons of 

 stones from the old Tower of London, rescued 

 from the road by the Demonstrator of plants, 

 Stanesby Alchorne, Apothecary and assay 

 master of the mint stones which had seen the 

 centuries of tragedy ; the heroism and the 

 villainy ; the selfishness and self-sacrifice which 

 had gone to the making of England. 2 



To these Mr. John Chandler contributed 

 " a large quantity of Flints and Chalk," and 

 (it is to be hoped much later on) there were 



1 Journal of Sir Joseph Banks, edited by Sir Joseph Hooker, 

 P- 3 1 - 



2 In 1772 during alterations in the Tower ruins of an old stone 

 wall nine feet in thickness, with Roman coins, were found. 

 Wheatley's London Past and Present. 



