Obituary. 6S9 



your numerous questions ; and, happy in being thus instrumentally useful 

 towards the welfare of a beautiful science, I am, with very respectful com- 

 pliments to Mr. Hodson, yours, &c. 



Ninth Letter, dated March 27. 1829. — " As to the Croci and iVarcissi, 

 you gave me in autumn ; they have, perhaps, done a good thing, in actually 

 stimulating me to re-examine all my own lately much neglected collection 

 of hardy bulbs (a very good one) ; to reprint their labels and set them 



to rights." "If you have flowers of any other hardy bulbs, 



that you wish examined this season by me, I will settle any such you 

 like to send." 



Tenth Letter, received May 24. 1829, dated May 20. — Contains an 

 abundance of technical information, and as much pleasantry as technicalities 

 admit, and the following observation, which will show that Mr. Haworth's 

 spirit was not of the imperious and self-sufficient kind : — " ^S'axifragaB want 

 again revising. I have reduced them too much, owing to my good friend 

 Mr. Bree's sending me maoiy wild British ones, and saying he thought 

 them varieties ; but he afterwards candidly told me, he picked out strange 

 speci^nens to puzzle me." [Mr. Haworth's work on the species of 5axi- 

 fraga and the allied genera, which is entitled Saxifragearum Enumeratio, 

 is dedicated to the Rev. W. T. Bree*, Allesley Rectory, near Coventry, 

 Warwickshire. — J. D.] 



•Eleventh Letter, received June IQ. 1829. — " I prefer moderate-sized 

 specimens to large ones, if from a garden, but I collect the finest wild ones 



I can." " But I am so hurried and overwhelmed just now 



with (voluntary) business, attending several sales, watering plants in pots, 



for I have no gardener, &c." "I have just been to Mr. 



Sweet's, about two miles off, who showed me the figure of ." 



Twelfth Letter, July 6. 1829. — " I have given up purchasing insects, 

 and shall in future devote my leisure to botany and gardening." 



Thirteenth Letter, July 27. 1829. — " [ was out for eight or ten days 

 when your specimens arrived, but Mrs. Haworth (who is fond of plants) 

 had, by my return, made excellent dried specimens of them." . . . 



" A new green-house, or hardy succulent, is very welcome to me. So, 

 too, would more tender ones be, could I afford to build a stove ; but ' all 

 men cannot do all things.' " 



Sixteenth Letter, September 29. 1829. — [I had at this time, a con- 



* I cannot allow myself to fear Mr. Bree's disapproving the liberty I 

 take in introducing here some extracts from a letter lately received from 

 him : it is dated September 3. 1833, and was not written for publication. 

 " I was exceedingly shocked, on receiving my Magazine of Natural History 

 [the number for September] yesterday, to see announced on the cover the 

 death of my poor friend Haworth : half an hour afterwards, I got your 

 packet containing Mr. Main's confirmation of the melancholy event, and 

 to-day's post brought me a letter from his son, with the same sad in- 

 telligence. Though he was now advanced in years, I had hoped to enjoy 

 his friendship and agreeable correspondence for some time to come : but 

 God's will be done ! The last letter I had from my friend bears date only 

 the 25th of July, and it accompanied a large collection of cuttings of all 

 his spareabJe Chinese chrysanthemums, which have hardly yet taken root. 



I shall long and deeply feel his loss _ Our friend's acute- 



ness in discovering nice distinctions in species and varieties surpassed every 

 thing of the kind I have ever seen, and, indeed, was carried almost to a 

 fault. You know, I believe, that he was originally designed for the law, 

 and was for some time with Mr. Frost, a solicitor at Hull, I think ; but he 

 early gave up all professional views, and devoted himself to natural 

 history." 



