106 THE JOURNAL OF BOTANY 



England for South America he urged Fryer to accompany him, 

 but family considerations did not permit the latter to accept the 

 offer, as he had just lost his first wife. 



Circumstances took a decided change when, about 1846 or 

 1847, he became acquainted wdth a neW' circle of friends in London, 

 including some belonging to the Pre-Eaphaelite Brotherhood. 

 It does not seem that he saw much of Holm an Hunt or Millais, 

 but he was very intimate with the Eossettis and still more 

 with Coventry Patmore, in one of whose letters he is referred 

 to as "a noble fellow and will be much nobler." His poetical 

 tendencies received much encouragement under these auspices, 

 and it seems that he thought of publishing a book of his own 

 verses. Nor was the advantage on his side alone, for he always 

 claimed the credit of inducing Dante Eossetti — w-ho had then 

 only contributed to The Germ, the periodical of the Brother- 

 hood — to turn his attention to poetry rather than to painting. 

 Eossetti and Keats seem to have been Fryer's favourite authors, 

 with Browning and perhaps Tennyson next in order ; towards the 

 end of his life, however, he changed his ideas a little, and often 

 said that Shakespeare was above them all. These London friend- 

 ships continued for a time after Fryer returned to Cambridge- 

 shire ; but even that with Patmore lapsed when the poet became 

 a Eoman Catholic, or a little later. 



The life of Patmore by Mr. Basil Champneys contains many 

 letters from and references to Fryer, w4io was invited to con- 

 tribute his reminiscences to it : but he says, writing to one of us 

 at the end of 1899: "I refused any help of the kind ; Coventry 

 laid his soul fairly open to me — w^e had little hid from each other 

 — but I have no right to let the public share his confidences to 

 me. We were closer than ordinary friends, almost or quite as 

 close as brothers. He had great natural gifts as a poet and 

 might have been one of our great ones if he had been true to his 

 first impulses." 



Fryer w^as always ready to talk and to write to appreciative 

 friends and correspondents on matters relating to literature : the 

 letter just quoted continues : — 



" Dante Kossetti was true, and his name will grow bigger year by 

 year. Have you ever noticed how Catholic his inspiration is ? Without 

 the influence of your Church he would never have been quite what he 

 was in form. I rank him as only a little less than Shakespeare and 

 Keats in natural inspiration, though, like the latter, there was not a full 

 outcome of the innate power. 



" Looking over old letters to destroy them, now my life is near its 

 end, I find an invitation to a meeting of the * P. R. B.' — a 'set' I would 

 have liked had occasion permitted. Dante Eossetti introduced me to 

 several of them on the sole occasion I saw him at his own house. He 

 was bigger than either his poetry or his less excellent painting, and I 

 regret that I did not keep up the friendship that promised so well." 



The next, and to our readers the most important, stage of 

 Fryer's life begins about 1848, wdien we find him finally settled 

 down in his native district, and turning his w^hole attention to 

 science. His energy was remarkable, and his physical powders 



