164 ASA GRAY. 



genus Carex, and at that time secretary of the Linnrcan Society, 

 opened to him every botanical door. Here he saw Robert Brown, 

 then the chief botanical figure in Europe, with the exception, 

 perhaps, of De Candolle ; and Menzies, who fifty years before had 

 sailed as naturalist with Vancouver on his great voyage of dis- 

 covery ; and Lambert, the author of the sumptuous history of the 

 genus l } i mts, in whose hospitable dining-room were stored the 

 plants upon which Pursh had based his North -American Flora. 

 Here, too, he met Bentham and Lindley and Bauer, and all the 

 other workers in his scientific field. 



" A visit to Paris brought him the acquaintance of the group of 

 distinguished botanists then living at the French capital : P. Barker 

 Webb, a writer upon the botany of Spain ; the Baron Delessert, 

 Achille Richard, whose father had written the Flora of Michaux ; 

 Mirbel, already old, still actively engaged in investigations upon 

 vegetable anatomy ; Spach ; Decaisne, then a young aide natn- 

 raliste at the Jardin des Plantes, of which he was afterwards to 

 become the distinguished director; Auguste St. Hilaire, the natu- 

 ralist of the Duke of Luxembourg's expedition to Brazil, and at 

 that time in the full enjoyment of a great reputation earned by his 

 works upon the Brazilian flora ; Jacques Gay ; Gaudichaud, the 

 naturalist of the voyage of L'Uranie and La Physicienne ; the 

 young Swiss botanist, Edmond Boissier, the Spanish traveller, and, 

 later, one of the most important contributors to systematic botany 

 in his classical ' Flora Orientalis ;' Adrien de Jussieu, grand- 

 nephew of Bernard, and son of Laurent de Jussieu, himself a 

 worthy and distinguished representative of a family unequalled in 

 botanical fame and accomplishment. 



44 At Montpellier, Mr. Gray passed several days with the 

 botanists Delile and Dimal, and then hurried on to Italy, where at 

 Padua, in the most ancient botanical garden in Europe, he made 

 the acqua : ntance of Visiani, at that time one of the principal 

 botanists in Italy ; at Vienna he saw the learned Endlicher, the 

 author of a classical ■ Genera Plantaruin ;' and at Munich, Von 

 Martins* the renowned Brazilian traveller, the historian of the 

 palms, and the earliest contributor to that stupendous work, the 

 1 Flora Brasiliensis,' which bears his name ; and here, too, was 

 Zuccarini, the collaborator with Von Siebold in the ' Flora 

 Japonica.' Geneva then, as at the present time, was a centre oj 

 scientific activity ; and there he made the personal acquaintance ot 

 the De Candolles, father and son, and worked in their unrivalled 

 herbarium and library. He saw Schlechtendal at Halle ; and at 

 Berlin, Klotzsch, Kunth, and Ehrenberg — familiar names in the 

 annals of botanical science. Alphonse De Candolle and Sir Joseplj 

 Hooker alone are left of the brilliant group of distinguished 

 naturalists who cordially welcomed the young American botanist 

 in 1839. 



" The scientific results of this journey were important, MM* 

 identity of many doubtful American species was settled, and con- 

 fused ynonvmy made clear, by critical examinations of the plants 

 in the Linnaan Herbarium, then in London* as well as tho W 



