508 BOTANY. [Oh. XVI. 



And in March, when he was extremely unwell, he wrote : — 



" A few words about the stove-plants ; they do so amuse me. 

 I have crawled to see them two or three times. Will you 

 correct and answer, and return enclosed. I have hunted in all 

 my books and cannot find these names, and I like much to 

 know the family." His difficulty with regard to the names of 

 plants is illustrated, with regard to a Lupine on which he was 

 at work, in an extract from a letter (July 21, 1866) to Sir 

 J. D. Hooker : " I sent to the nursery garden, whence I bought 

 the seed, and could only hear that it was ' the common blue 

 Lupine,' the man saying 'he was no scholard, and did not 

 know Latin, and that parties who make experiments ought to 

 find out the names.' " 



The book was published May 15th, 1862. Of its reception he 

 writes to Mr. Murray, June 13th and 18th : — 



" The Botanists praise my Orchid-book to the skies. Some 

 one sent me (perhaps you) the Parthenon, with a good review. 

 The Athenaeum* treats me with very kind pity and contempt ; 

 but the reviewer knew nothing of his subject." 



" There is a superb, but I fear exaggerated, review in the 

 London Review.] But I have not been a fool, as I thought I 

 was, to publish ; for Asa Gray, about the most competent judge 

 in the world, thinks almost as highly of the book as does the 

 London Review. The Athenseum will hinder the sale greatly." 



The Kev. M. J. Berkeley was the author of the notice in the 

 London Review, as my father learned from Sir J. D. Hooker, 

 who added, " I thought it very well done indeed. I have read 

 a good deal of the Orchid-book, and echo all he says." 



To this my father replied (June 30th, 1862) :— 



" My dear old friend, — You speak of my warming the cockles 

 of your heart, but you will never know how often you have 

 warmed mine. It is not your approbation of my scientific 

 work (though I care for that more than for any one's) : it is 

 something deeper. To this day I remember keenly a letter 

 you wrote to me from Oxford, when I was at the Water-cure, 

 and how it cheered me when I was utterly weary of life. 

 Well, my Orchid-book is a success (but I do not know whether 

 it sells)." 



In another letter to the same friend, he wrote : — 



" You have pleased me much by what you say in regard to 

 Bentham and Oliver approving of my book ; for I had got a 

 sort of nervousness, and doubted whether I had not made an 

 egregious fool of myself, and concocted pleasant little stinging 



• May 24th, 1862. t June 14th, 1862. 



