257 



NOTES ON YORKSHIRE BOTANY IN 1727. 



HERBERT E. WROOT, 

 Bradford. 



Amon'G the valuable stores of imprinted manuscripts in the 

 library of Sir Mathew \V. Wilson, Bart., at Eshton Hall, are 

 the followini^ letters written by Dr. Richard Richardson, of 

 Bierley Hall, Bradford, to Samuel Brewer. Both writer and 

 recipient were botanists of distinction. Richardson (born 1663, 

 died 1741) was a man of wealth, and not only liberally patronised 

 less favoured botanists, but was himself an ardent student of 

 plants, and especially of the cryptOi^amia. He founded at his 

 residence at Bierley the first botanical garden in the north of 

 England, and one of the best, if not the best, of its kind in the 

 country. Dillenius, who was Richardson's intimate friend, 

 disting-uished him as one of the two men — the other being- 

 James Sherard — who, by repeated botanical investig^ations 

 through England, had most enlarged the list of its plants, and 

 fixed the habitats of specimens previously unsettled. Linnaeus, 

 who was acquainted with Richardson, called a plant after him. 



Samuel Brewer (died 1743?), to whom the letters are 

 addressed, was a native of Trowbridge in Wiltshire, but, being 

 unsuccessful in business there, he came north. He was the 

 companion of Dillenius in a tour to the Mendips, and thence to 

 Bristol, passings onward to North Wales and Anglesey in 1726, 

 and he remained in Bangfor for some months, sending' plants to 

 Dillenius. The letters of Richardson to him were mainly notes 

 of the habitats of rare plants in Wales, written to facilitate 

 Brewer's searches. These have been printed, but the description 

 of the botany of Ing-leton has not hitherto been transcribed. As 

 will be seen, Richardson invites Brewer to Yorkshire, and that 

 invitation was accepted. In the autumn of 1727 he took up his 

 residence in Yorkshire, living first at Bingley, and afterwards 

 at Bierley, near Dr. Richardson, who befriended him. He 

 remained at Bierley for some years, and died there. 



[From Dr. Rich.ari^ Richardson fo Samiel Brewer, at Bangor.] 



North Bierley, May 26, 1727. 



[Extract.] — ' I intend to spend a few days in Craven, to 

 fetch from thence some plants which 1 have lost out of my 

 garden, that my friends in the south desire. Ing;leton shall be 

 my farthest stage, which is not much above thirty miles from 



1906 August I. 



