34 THE JOURNAL OF BOTANY 



botany of an excursion made in 1848 from Darjeeling to Tonglo, 

 and the other on the climate and vegetation of Nipal and Sikkim. 

 We have akeady alluded to the publication of a preliminary sketch, 

 as it were, of his journals in his father's Journal of Botany, during 

 his absence; and in 1849-51 the sumptuous Rhododendrons of the 

 Sikkim Himalaya was issued in parts, under Sir William's editor- 

 ship, with thirty coloured plates, elaborated by Walter Fitch from 

 Hooker's sketches, illustrative of the many fine species of that 

 genus which he introduced. In 1854 appeared the Himalayan 

 Joiirnals in two volumes, a somewhat condensed edition following 

 a year later. So great is the number of semi-scientific, semi- 

 popular books of travel of late years that the interest in any one 

 of them is apt to be short-lived. It is, therefore, no slight testi- 

 mony to the permanent value of this work of Hooker's that a 

 cheap popular edition should have been called for in 1891. At 

 the same time, if only for its appendices, it is a work that the 

 scientific student of geographical distribution cannot afford to 

 overlook. It appeared, however, that the systematist was to see 

 the botanical results of the journey when, in 1855, the first volume 

 of the Flora Indica by Hooker and Thomson made its appearance. 

 The first half of this volume is occupied by an admirable essay, 

 which, from internal evidence, we should judge to be mainly the 

 work of Hooker, on the history of botany in India and the rela- 

 tionships of the Indian flora. In this, as in the Introductory 

 Essay to the Flora of Neio Zealand, which had appeared two 

 years before. Hooker, whilst still professing his adherence — mainly 

 for the convenience of systematic treatment — to the hypothesis 

 of the permanence or fixity of species, gives almost unqualified 

 submission to the methods of Edward Forbes in explaining plant- 

 migration by extensive recent changes in the distribution of land 

 and water. This gave rise to the vigorous though friendly pro- 

 tests of Darwin, which form part of many of his letters both to 

 Hooker and Lyell. The second half of the volume only carries 

 the description of species, which are in Latin, down to Fumariacece, 

 averaging about two species to a page. The plan of the work 

 was too extensive and it was abandoned, to be replaced by 

 another more feasible at a later date. As contained in the odd 

 volume of an unfinished work, the valuable introductory essay is 

 in some danger of being overlooked ; but visitors to the Herbarium 

 or the Museum at Kew can hardly fail to have their attention 

 arrested by the excellent physical map of India — the work of the 

 authors — taken from this work. 



Hooker had been elected a Fellow of the Eoyal Society on the 

 merits of the Flora Antarctica in 1847 ; and, when this had been 

 followed by most of the Florce Novce Zelandicce and much of the 

 preliminary publication of his Indian results, he was, in 1854, 

 awarded the Eoyal Medal of the Society. In the same year his 

 paper on the rostellum of Listera ovata appeared in the Philo- 

 sophical Transactions. The year 1855 was, however, even more 

 momentous in his career. Not only did it witness the completion 

 of the Netu Zealand Flora, the publication of the one volume of 



