210 CENTENARY OF THE LINNEAN SOCIETY OF LONDON. 



widely distant places. Untiring was his zeal and unparalleled his 

 power of stimulating persons of the most varied positions in life — 

 monarchs and students, lords and poor seamen, bishops and 

 ignorant tradesmen — all to work to one end. Devoted scholars, 

 young and old, surrounded his chair. His disciples went to 

 unknown regions to collect for him the treasures of nature, and 

 many of them perished in foreign lands as the martyrs of natural 

 science. Nowhere, next to his own native land, had his name been 

 so revered as in England. The botanist Dillenius pressed him to 

 remain at Oxford " to live and die with him." He was in active 

 correspondence with nearly all England's naturalists, several of 

 whom had enjoyed his instruction in Upsala. England, unluckily 

 for Sweden, finally became his heir. In conclusion, Professor 

 Fries said : " Many are consequently the ties by which the memory 

 of Linnaeus is united with England, the strongest, however, is the 

 Linnean spirit — the genuine spirit of freshness and enterprise 

 in which scientific research has continued, and still continues, in 

 England. Is it not probable that this fact is due, in some measure 

 at least, to the transfer of the Linnean collections here ? At any 

 rate it was that which gave the primary incentive to the formation 

 of this Society, which has now, for a hundred years, uninter- 

 ruptedly manifested its vigorous life, extending its useful activity 

 more and more over the whole globe. The precious gift of Sir 

 James Edward Smith was indeed a noble seed, since grown up 

 into a strong plant, which has borne flowers and fruits from year to 

 year in abundance. Its vitality is a guarantee that it will thrive 

 and flourish, so long as the Linncea borealis, ever green, spreads its 

 fragrance over young and old, high and low, rich and poor, in the 

 mighty forests of the north." 



Sir Joseph Hooker pronounced the eulogium on Eobert Brown, 

 who was recognized as the greatest botanist of his age. Passing 

 over the life, history, and personality of Robert Brown, the eulogist 

 gave some account of his investigations and discoveries relating to 

 the morphology, classification, and distribution of plants, and 

 especially to their reproductive organs, their structure and economy 

 — investigations which display an untiring industry, an accuracy of 

 observation and exposition, a keenness of perception, together with 

 sagacity, caution, and soundness of judgment, in which he has not 

 been surpassed by any botanical writer. Where others have 

 advanced beyond the goal he attained to, it has been by working on 

 the foundations he laid, by the light and aids of correlative 

 advances in chemistry and physics, and by the use of optical instru- 

 ments unknown in his day. His collection of about 4000 species 

 of plants belonging to all orders, and three-fourths of them new to 

 science, in nine years, was a feat unexampled in the history ol 

 botanical science. Li the course of a detailed review of his works, 

 Sir Joseph gave some personal reminiscences, including these : 

 ' His appetite for acquiring botanical knowledge amounted, I believe, 

 to voracity, while his wonderful memory enabled him to retain, ana 

 his methodical faculties to classify all he had acquired. Of that 

 memory and of his readme in utilizing i* T had. thanks to 



