iv 
In 1873 a member of the Kew staff (Curator from 1886 to 
1901), Mr. George Nicholson, F.L.S., compiled a list of the native 
(and a few naturalised) plants occurring spontaneously at Kew. 
This was published in the Journal of Botany for 1875. Mr. R. I. 
Lynch, Curator of the Botanie Garden, Cambridge, also formerly a 
member of the Kew staff, materially contributed to its complete- 
ness from his own observations, and the late Lord de Tabley, 
better known to botanists as the Hon. John Leicester Warren, 
was keenly interested in it. 
In the Kew Bulletin for 1897 (pp. 115-167) a first attempt was 
made to catalogue the Mycologic Flora by Mr. G. Massee, F.L.S., 
a Principal Assistant in the Herbarium. The following passage is 
quoted from the prefatory note :— 
*Of the Royal Gardens themselves some 100 acres is little 
disturbed by any kind of cultivation, and it has certainly remained 
80 for at least a century and a half. Some portions may never 
possibly have been subjected to cultivation at all. It is not sur- 
prising therefore that in the background of horticultural treatment 
there still subsists a wild fauna and flora of no inconsiderable 
dimensions. This, as opportunity offers, it is proposed to work 
out and catalogue from time to time.” 
The Moss Flora was contributed to the Bulletin for 1899 
(pp. 7-17) by Mr. E. S. Salmon, F.L.8. 
Meanwhile Mr. Nicholson had steadily devoted his leisure hours 
to the comprehensive scheme contemplated in 1897. He enlisted 
the assistance of a number of scientific friends, specialists in 
various groups, to whom he communicated his enthusiasm for the 
work and without whose efficient help it would, even in a tentative 
form, have been impossible of achievement. 
I looked forward to this in Mr. Nicholson's hands with much 
interest and satisfaction. Unhappily, the breakdown of his health 
and his consequent retirement from the post of Curator in 1901 
compelled him to abandon a labour to which he no longer felt 
equal. Asthere was no immediate chance of anyone carrying it 
on with Mr. Nicholson's energy, I decided to publish the material 
he had accumulated as at any rate a starting point for further 
research. I placed the papers in the hands of Mr. Pearson, M.A., 
F.L.S., who in the same year had been appointed an Assistant. 
