PRINCIPAL GARDENERS—WILLIAM MCNAB. 319 
point which my se eas has given me some means of forming a 
judgment upon. We are all aware of the prodigious i capt en ge’ 
which have within dae few years taken place in every s 
knowledge and business. The art of gardening has not Beit still, 
but has progressed at railway speed, and now we have a vast 
_ instruction of the scientific and practical gardener. It is said that 
this knowledge will enable the rising gardeners greatly to excel their 
predecessors, and also save them a great deal of toil and stu 
formerly required. I warn my younger brethren against being misled 
such ideas. Theory is all very well, but I can assure my youn 
ties in the discharge of his duties in the Royal Botanic 
Garden, William McNab died there in harness on 1st December, 
1848, when nineteen months short of three score and ten years, 
and after a service to it of thirty-eight years as Principal 
Gardener. He was buried in the new Calton Burying Ground 
beside his wife, who had predeceased him by four years.? 
In the Edinburgh Evening Courant of 16th December, 1848, 
is to be found an account of the tribute to his worth expressed 
at the annual winter meeting of the Caledonian Horticultural 
Society, of which Society he was a corresponding member, as he 
ad been, since 1820, of the similar society in London. 
From 1825 he had been an associate of the Linnean Society 
of London. He was also an associate of the London Medico- 
Botanical Society, and one of the founders of the Edinburgh 
Botanical Society in 1836. 
' The grave is situated about the middle of the area and is marked by a headstone 
inscribed : 1834 | The Burying ground of | William McNab | ge Botanic Garden | 
