NATHANIEL BAGSHAW WARD. 1 



Nathaniel Bagshaw Ward, Fellow of the Royal and Lin- 

 naean societies, after whom, as its inventor, the Wardian case 

 is named, died at the ripe age of seventy-seven years, on the 4th 

 of June last. He was born in the east end of London, where 

 his father was a medical practitioner of repute, and where for 

 the greater part of his busy and most useful life he laboriously 

 devoted himself to the same profession. About twenty years 

 ago he exchanged the smoke-charged atmosphere and dingy 

 dwellings of Wellclose Square for the pleasant and airy 

 suburb of Clapham Rise, but still actively engaged almost to 

 the last in professional practice, and in his various official 

 duties, mainly in connection with the Apothecaries Society, 

 filling in succession nearly all its important offices. The ren- 

 ovation and even the maintenance of the celebrated Apothe- 

 caries Garden at Chelsea — the oldest botanical establishment 

 of the country — is probably mainly due to his counsels and 

 exertions. We cannot here enter into the interesting history 

 of the now familiar Wardian case, — a discovery which grew 

 out of Mr. Ward's persistent endeavors to cultivate the plants 

 he delighted in under the smoke and soot of the dingiest part 

 of London, and which resulted in providing for the poor as 

 well as the rich denizens of the smoky towns of the old world 

 the inexpensive but invaluable luxury or comfort of being sur- 

 rounded at all seasons with growing plants and fresh flowers. 

 Nor is the invention less applicable to house-culture, especially 

 of Ferns, under the clearer and purer air of our own country 

 rendered arid by the cold of winter, as hundreds could testify 

 who have enjoyed the benefit, perhaps without knowing even 

 the name of their benefactor. Equally important is the appli- 

 cation of the Wardian case to the conveyance of living plants 

 between distant countries. The writer well remembers the 



1 American Journal of Science and Arts, 2 ser., xlvii. 141. (1869.) 



