16 THE MUSIC OF WILD FLOWERS 



preserved, and through the kindness and courtesy of 

 Mr John Murray I have had the rare pleasure and privi- 

 lege of examining them. They consist for the most 

 part of extracts, written in a singularly clear and 

 beautiful hand, from botanical transactions, such as 

 those of the Linnaean Society, and from such works as 

 Curtis's Flora Londinensis, together with observations 

 on mosses, fungi and ferns. One notebook contains 

 no less than fifty pages relating to British fungi, copied 

 out, in the same exquisite handwriting, from Withering's 

 Botany ; another notebook deals with the sedges, and 

 also includes long descriptions, taken from Withering, 

 of British seaweeds. Occasionally we meet with re- 

 marks on the medicinal virtues of plants, an aspect of 

 botany which was doubtless of special interest to one 

 who had practised as an apothecary. 



At one time Crabbe contemplated writing an English 

 treatise on botany. Indeed the work was virtually 

 completed, when, in consequence of the criticism of the 

 Vice-Master of Trinity College, Cambridge, who could 

 not tolerate the idea of " degrading the science of botany 

 by treating it in a modern language," Crabbe flung the 

 manuscript into the fire. The poet often regretted this 

 hasty action in after years, as otherwise he might have 

 had the honour of being the recognised discoverer of 

 more than one species of the British flora. He would 

 specially mention a rare clover, which he found on the 

 seashore at Aldeburgh, and which the distinguished 

 botanist, Sir Joseph Banks, identified as Trifolium 

 suffocatum, a species hitherto unknown in England. 

 This particular specimen is now preserved in the Banks 

 Herbarium in the British Museum. It would take up 

 too much space to attempt to treat the botanical allu- 



