1880] A depressing Year. 273 



and to the Botanic Garden," and on the 25th of February 

 the note is registered in his journal " leg-wound closed 

 and healed." 



A year had thus been passed under extremely depress- 

 ing conditions. Even correspondence, during the autumn 

 and winter of 1879, had been scarcely practicable, except 

 for the few weeks which followed his resumption of Museum 

 duty on the loth of November. But it is remarkable how 

 quickly he then set about making up for lost time. Messrs. 

 H. and J. Groves were now preparing their " Review of 

 the British Characeae," which appeared in the Journal 

 of Botany for 1880; and his collection, forwarded for their 

 examination, is thus acknowledged in a letter from Mr. H. 

 Groves, dated November i7th, 1879': 



MY DEAR SIR, I safely received the splendid set of Charas which 

 you have so obligingly sent me, and am sure they will teach us a great 

 deal about our British species. Your kind letter came to hand this 

 morning, and I shall take advantage (when returning the specimens) of 

 your kind permission to mention two or three forms which you have in 

 duplicate, of which I am anxious to obtain specimens. And I hope I 

 may add a few of our collecting, although I cannot hope to repay you 

 for your kindness in sending the best set of British specimens which I 

 have seen. 



On Dec. i6th he writes a characteristic letter to Prof. 

 Babington : 



DEAR BABINGTON, Will you kindly excuse my troubling you with 



two specimens I am getting together what notes I can for the 



second supplement, but it is discouraging to find how little has been 

 done of late years. We really have so very few field botanists whose 

 reports can be trusted. 



I am very anxious to try and trace out a bit of information about the 

 old Irish botanist, Rev. Mr. or Rev. Dr. Heaton, who contributed to 

 How's " Phytologia," 1650. It was Newbould who once told me that 

 he had found out he was a Fellow of Clare Coll., Cambridge, but N. 

 cannot now remember where he met with this information. Now, surely 

 there must be a list kept at Clare College of the Fellows, and probably 

 M.A.'s and other degrees, with their dates, and could you, without too 

 much trouble, either make the inquiry or tell me to whom I could write. 

 A friend of mine here who is much given to antiquarian research thinks 

 he has found Heaton' s name as holding an Irish deanery, and it would 



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