304 Obituary. 



" It was about the year 1795 that Mr. Knight began to be publicly known 

 as a vegetable physiologist. In that year he laid before the Royal Society his 

 celebrated paper upon the inheritance of disease among fruit trees, and the pro- 

 pagation of debility by grafting. This was succeeded by accounts of expe- 

 rimental researches into vegetable fecundation, the ascent and descent of sap 

 in trees, the phenomena of germination, the influence of light upon leaves, and 

 a great variety of similar subjects. In all these researches the originality of 

 the experiments was very remarkable, and the care with which the results were 

 given was so great, that the most captious of subsequent writers have admitted 

 the accuracy of the facts produced by Mr. Knight, however much they may 

 have differed from him in the conclusions which they draw from them. 



" The great object which Mr. Knight set before himself, and which he pursued 

 through his long life v/ith undeviating steadiness of purpose, was utility. Mere 

 curious speculations seem to have engaged his attention but little j it was only 

 when facts had some great practical bearing that he applied himself seriously 

 to investigate the phenomena connected with them. For this reason, to 

 improve the races of domesticated plants, to establish important points of cul- 

 tivation upon sound physiological reasoning, to increase the amount of food 

 which maybe procured from a given space of land (all of them subjects closely 

 connected with the welfare of his country), are more especially the topics of the 

 numerous papers communicated by him to various societies, especially the 

 horticultural, in the chair of which he succeeded his friend Sir Joseph Banks. 

 Whoever calls to mind what gardens were only twenty years ago, and what 

 they now are, must be sensible of the extraordinary improvement which has 

 taken place in the art of horticulture during that period. This change is 

 unquestionably traceable, in a more evident manner, to the practice and writ- 

 ings of Mr. Knight than to all other causes combined. Alterations first 

 suggested by himself, or by the principles which he explained in a popular 

 manner, small at first, increasing by degrees, have insensibly led, in the art 

 of gardening, to the most extensive improvements, the real origin of which 

 has already, as always happens in such cases, been forgotten, except by those 

 who are familiar with the career of Mr. Knight, and who know that it is 

 to him that they are owing. Of domesticated fruits, or culinary vegetables, 

 there is not a race that has not been ameliorated under his direction, or 

 immediate and personal superintendence ; and if, henceforward, the English 

 yeoman can command the garden luxuries that were once confined to the 

 great and wealthy, it is to Mr. Knight, far more than to any other person, 

 that the gratitude of the country is due. 



" The feelings thus evinced in the tendency of his scientific pursuits were 

 extended to the offices of private life. Never was there a man possessed of 

 greater kindness and benevolence, and whose loss has been more severely felt, 

 not only by his immediate family, but by his numerous tenantry and dependants. 

 And yet, notwithstanding the tenderness of his affection for those around him, 

 when it pleased heaven to visit him, some years since, with the heaviest 

 calamity that could befal a father, in the sudden death of an only and much 

 beloved son, Mr. Knight's philosophy was fully equal to sustain him in his 

 trial. 



" Mr. Knight's political opinions were as free from prejudices as his scientific 

 views : his whole heart was with the liberal party, of which he was all his life 

 a strenuous supporter. 



" It is no exaggeration to add that, great as is the loss sustained by his 

 country and his friends, it will be equally difficult to fill his vacancy in science. 

 No living man now before the world can be said to rank with him in that par- 

 ticular branch of science to which his life was devoted. 



" Mr. Knight died in London, at the house of Mrs. Walpole, one of his 

 daughters, after a short illness, on the 11th of May, in the eightieth year of 

 his age. — J. L." (^Athenteum, May 19.) 



