HENRY FLETCHER HANCE. 9 
age when his constitution was hardly formed, he had for years no 
opportunity to recruit by change to a more bracing climate. The 
was no physician at Whampoa, and while there Dr. Hance was 
forced not only to prescribe, but often to compound, medicines for 
himself and his family. He writes of this in August, 1880, when, 
with his vre youngest children near the point of death, he had had 
the anxiety of treating them, whilst suffering himself from 
severe Siauecok fever and touches of delirium. And yet, in the 
midst of all this, he speaks of re-arranging the Incomplete and 
Gymunegae of his herbarium according to the new volume of the 
* Genera !’ 
From the beginning of my eepscvonieney with him in 1869, 
he baa frequently mentioned the interruption of his work by 
illness, but from 1880 onwards ay me 0 allusions to failing 
health became almost incessant. IJ cannot refrain from ting 
a few of these passages, for they give a most touching picture of 
his agony of mind and body. On Des ember 22nd, 1880, he writes 
from gene pe :—‘ I have been terribly held back from writing by 
sickness and anxieties of one and another, and this place 
‘Journal of Botany’ scarcely —— anything of mine, and in a 
vianaae y where there is so much novelty I shoei like to do twice 
uch as Ido. Indeed I think it a a- duty, when one has the 
“Tam sick, aging, ill-disposed, and too often unequal to any work. 
Ido not think I can stay hae much longer, or be of any use to. 
science.’ 
Fevers, congestion of the liver, and other serious complications, 
sapped his strength and robbed him of working hours more an 
gg ordered to alacao te three months’ absolute rest. He seems 
to have derived some benefit from this change, as on December 
5, he sat from Whampoa in better spirits. It may, 
however, be doubted whether the relief was more than temporary, 
ee awe ear ere REE er 
Here a by Dr. Manson (well known in Europe for his 
researches on the b food filaria), of whose kindness and professional ability he 
