﻿the trouble to distinguish them, so that the reader of Lindley's 

 accounts of Reevesian plants often remains in doubt whether by 

 "Mr. Reeves" he means the father or the son. 



John Reeves (senior) was born at West Ham in 1774. From 

 1812 to 1831 he lived at Macao and Canton, where he held the post 

 of Inspector of Tea to the East India Company. After his return 

 to England, in 1831, he lived at Clapham, where he died March 

 22nd, 1856. 



His son, John Russell Reeves (junior), was born in 1804. He 

 perhaps accompanied his father when the latter went to China in 

 1812. He died on May 1st, 1877, at Wimbledon, Surrey. In the 

 obituary notice of him, given in the Gardener*' Chronicle, Iy77, i. 

 604 (see also Journ. Bot. 1877, 192), he is stated to have lived 

 thirty years in China. I have not been able to ascertain when he 

 returned to England. The Chinese Repository, a periodical published 

 since 1833 at Canton, gives from time to time complete lists of 

 European residents in China. In the list for 1837 I find Reeves 

 (Christian name not given) mentioned among the residents in 

 Lintin, an island in the estuary of the Canton River, where in 

 former times European ships trading with Canton used to anchor. 

 Reeves's name does not appear in the next list for 1841. Whether 

 he was then on leave or had left for good cannot be decided. 



The Gard, ners chrunh le, I.e., attributes to John Russell Reeves, 

 jun., the introduction of Beevesia thyrsoidea and Spiraa Ueeeemi. 

 Lindley, however, who in 1827 established the new genus Beevesia, 

 clearly states (Branded Journ. n. s. ii. 1827, 112; lJ,)t. II,,,. t. 1230 

 (1829) ) that dried specimens of the plant had been first sent by 

 Mr. John Reeves to the Horticultural Society, and that he named 



resident i 



ascribing the introduction of S. Beevesii to the younger ', 

 This name appears first in Bot. Beg. 1841, Misc. Notes, p. 45, where 

 Lindley speaks of Spireea lanceolata, then cultivated at London, 

 observing that in gardens it is known as S. Beevesiana. Afterwards 

 he found that it was different from S. lanceolata, and described and 

 figured it in Bot. Bey. t. 10, 1844, under the name of S. Beevesii, as 

 a Chinese plant " introduced by Mr. Reeves, whose name it bears." 

 Herbarium specimens of 8. lanceolata were first brought to France 

 by Commerson from Isle de France (Mauritius), where the plant 

 had probably been introduced from China. Poiret first described it 

 in Encycl. Bot. vii. 1816, 854. Cambessedes (Monogr. Spirtea, 

 Ann. Sc. Nat. 1824, i. 866, t. 25) figured it, and proved that it was 

 identical with Loureiro's S. cantoniensis. Loudon (Arb. et Frut. 

 Brit, ii. 1838, 732) writes that S. lanceolata, a native of the 

 Mauritius and China, had not then been introduced into European 

 gardens. Planchon's statement (Flore des Serres, 1856, t. 1097) 

 that 8. Beevesiana, at first considered to be S. lanceolata, was intro- 

 duced from China into English gardens in 1824, seems to me 

 unfounded. From the above accounts we may conclude that S. 



