Sa i 
ee ee ee 
£7. 47.) TO W. J. HOOKER. 433 
TO W. J. HOOKER. 
CaMBRIDGE, December 6, 1857. 
Your first letter is now gone to Sullivant, because 
you speak of him so handsomely, and say that Mitten 
is instructed to prepare a set of Mosses for him. A 
noble fellow is Sullivant and deserves all you say of 
him and his works. The more you get to know of him 
the better you will like him. 
Let me tell you about my “ Manual of the Botany 
of the Northern United States.” It was quite impossi- 
ble, of course, that the publishers should provide such 
illustrations as the fourteen plates and keep the book 
at a salable price, so Sullivant, on his own motion, had 
the eight plates of Musci engraved in copper, at his 
own cost, for $630 (about £126), and gave them to 
the work, after printing 250 copies for his separate 
booklet I sent you. I gave the six plates of Ferns, 
etc., cut on stone by Sprague to complete the plan. 
In the “Journal” you are wrong in supposing that 
the Musci were even drawn by Sprague. If in time 
please correct this when you notice his book. Sulli- 
vant drew them all with his own hands (as he did 
those of former memoirs which pleased you well), and 
had them copied and reduced to proper size by a Ger- 
man artist he employs. So that besides his labor, he 
has expended at least £180 in money, on these plates. 
They were executed on copper by a young engraver 
in Boston. 
Your second letter, begun the day the other was 
dispatched, reached me a few days ago, while dear 
Torrey was here on a visit. He has just returned to 
New York. We ealled to see Greene, but he was not 
a a's 
