A HISTORY OF ESSEX 



indigenous or to the planted species is uncertain. Of hellebore he 

 says, ' I dare not saye that ever I found the righte black hellebor, but 

 thys I dare holde, that a man for defaut of it, may use verye well that 

 kinde of bear foot that goeth every yeare into the grounde, whereof 

 groweth greate plentye in a parke besyde Colchester.' Of the mistletoe 

 he tells us that it grows more plentifully than elsewhere. 



Essex perhaps owes more to John Gerard than to any other early 

 botanist. 



Gerard was born at Nantwich in Cheshire in 1545. He was 

 educated in a neighbouring school, but at an early age he studied medi- 

 cine and travelled in Denmark, Poland, Sweden and Russia. In 1577 

 he had charge of the gardens of Lord Burleigh in the Strand and at 

 Theobalds in Hertfordshire, and at one time he had a house and garden 

 of his own in Holborn. In 1597 he became a warden of the Barber- 

 Surgeons Company, and issued his celebrated herbal, which was illus- 

 trated by i, 800 woodcuts, mostly reproduced from the Eicones Stirpium 

 of Taberncemontanus. This herbal records about seventy-five Essex plants. 



I must not pass from these pioneers in botanical science without 

 referring to Ray, who filled an important place among the great founders 

 of botany and zoology. To his works Linnaeus, BufFon, Jessieu, Brown, 

 De Candolle and others were largely indebted. Ray was born at Black 

 Notley near Braintree. The son of a blacksmith he studied at Cam- 

 bridge, entering at St. Catharine College and subsequently at Trinity 

 College. He was elected a fellow of Trinity in 1649. He was 

 appointed Greek lecturer of his college, and at the age of twenty-five 

 he was made mathematical tutor. He finally settled in our county, and 

 the house he lived in was destroyed by fire quite recently. The county 

 may well be proud to have given birth to this great man. 



More recent records of Essex botany are to be found in a catalogue 

 of plants in Cough's edition of Camden's Britannia, in Warner's Plantce 

 Woodfordiensis (pub. 1771), Watson's Botanical Guides, in the Phytologist, 

 in Smith's English Flora, Withering's works and several herbaria which 

 are preserved in the British Museum, and finally in Gibson, who, 

 assisted by a band of workers, published the first complete Essex Flora 

 in 1862, a work which will compare favourably with any county flora 

 since published. 



During the last twenty years many lists of plants found in the 

 county have been published in the journal of the Essex Field Club 

 (Essex Naturalist, edited by W. Cole). The plants thus added to the 

 records of the Essex flora are chiefly those belonging to the so-called 

 critical genera, which were not recognized as species in Gibson's day, 

 and casuals, some of which may establish themselves as permanent resi- 

 dents. The cryptogamic plants included in this article are almost 

 entirely derived from the above journal, and afford an example of the 

 value of such publications. That the contributors include the names of 

 Mr. E. A. L. Batters, Dr. M. C. Cooke, the Rev. James Crombie, 

 Messrs. English, E. M. Holmes, G. P. Hope, Worthington Smith 



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