Notices of European Herbaria. 7 



amiable and simple-hearted man, in 1768 ; and by him many 

 seeds, living plants, and interesting observations, were communi- 

 cated to LinncBUS, but few if any dried specimens. Dr. Garden, 

 who was a native of Scotland, resided at Charleston, South Caro- 

 lina, from about 1745 to the commencement of the American 

 Revolution, devoting all the time he could redeem from an ex- 

 tensive medical practice to the zealous pursuit of botany and zo- 

 ology. His chief correspondent was Ellis at London, but through 

 Ellis he commenced a correspondence with Linnasus; and to 

 both he sent manuscript descriptions of new plants and animals, 

 with many excellent critical observations. None of his speci- 

 mens addressed to the latter reached their destination, the ships 

 by which they were sent having been intercepted by French 

 cruisers ; and Linnaeus complained that he was often unable to 

 make out many of Dr. Garden's genera for want of the plants 

 themselves. Ellis was sometimes more fortunate ; but as he 

 seems usually to have contented himself with the transmission 

 of descriptions alone, we find no authentic specimens from Gar- 

 den in the Linnaean herbarium. 



We have now probably mentioned all the North American cor- 

 respondents of Linnasus ; for Dr. Kuhn, who appears only to have 

 brought him living specimens of the plant which bears his name, 

 and Catesby, who shortly before his death sent a few living plants 

 which his friend Lawson had collected in Carolina, can scarcely 

 be reckoned among the number.* 



against a botanist of these latter days. " I liave had the pleasure," Collinson 

 writes, " of reading your Sjjecies Plantarum, a very useful and laborious work. 

 But, my dear friend, we that admire you are much concerned that you should per- 

 plex the delightful science of botany with changing names that have been well 

 received, and adding new names quite unknown to us. Thus botany, which was 

 a pleasant study, and attainable by most men, is now become, by alterations and 

 new names, the study of a man's life, and none now but real professors can pre- 

 tend to attain it. As I love you, I tell you our sentiments." — Letter of April 20, 

 1754. " You have begun by your Species Plantarum; but if you will be for ever 

 making new names, and altering old and good ones, for such hard names that con- 

 vey no idea of the plant, it will be impossible to attain to a perfect knowledge in 

 the science of botany." — Letter of April lOtli, 1755; from Smith's Selection of the 

 Correspondence of Linnaus, 8fC, 



*In a letter to Haller, dated Leyden, Jan. 23, 1738, Linnseus writes; "You 

 would scarcely believe how many of the vegetable productions of Virginia are 

 the same as our European ones. There are Alps in the country of New York, for 

 the snow remains all summer long on the mountains there. I am now giving in- 

 structions to a medical student here, who is a native of that country, and will re- 



