102 



DEPARTMENTAL COMMITTEE ON BOTANICAL WORK 



Sir W. T. 



Thiselton- 



Dyer, 



K.C.M.G., 

 F.E.S. 



29 Nov. 1900. 



of tlie establishment was handed over to him. How this 

 came about I ■will endeavour to explain. 



Up to 1841 Kew, although performing public functions, 

 was technically a private establishment. Banks was a 

 sort of "go-between" the scientific world and the Go- 

 vernment. He retained all the documents. These in the 

 second codicil he left to Sir Edward Knatchbull to dis- 

 pose of. His purely scientific correspondence he be- 

 queathed to the British Museum. That relating to the 

 affairs of the Mint to it. Buls he made no specific direc- 

 tions as to the destination of his Colonial and Kew papers. 

 This was probably because at the time there was no ob- 

 vious recipient. 



The younger Alton, who was retired on the appoint- 

 ment of Sir William Hooker, made a clean sweep of all 

 the local documents and records. 



According to information derived from Sir Joseph 

 Hooker there was a small but valuable herbarium of 

 introduced exotic plants which had been cultivated at 

 Kew. The loss of this has often been deplored. It was 

 apparently transferred to the British Museum by Robert 

 Brown. 



The second codicil provides for the continuation of the 

 services of a draughtsman, Frederic Bauer, to make 

 " sketches and finished drawings of all new plants." 

 These were to be deposited "in the hands of William 

 Towns'hend, Aiton, Esquire, and his successors tto be 

 added to those before by me bequeathed to the Royal 

 establishment of the Botanic Garden at Kew." None 

 of these are here now, and it appears from a statement 

 in the Proceedings of the Linnean Society for May 24, 

 1841, p. 102, that they "are now preserved in the 

 British Museum." It seems clear that they are the 

 property of this establishment. 



It seems pretty clear from this recital that the Botani- 

 cal Department of the British Museum owes its existence 

 to Kew, of which it is in fact a mere accidental offshoot. 

 It is at any rate largely composed of collections made by 

 men sent out from Kew. W. T. T. D. 



P.S. — My impression is that Banks foresaw what Kew 

 was destined to be, but the circumstances of the day 

 were adverse to the realisation of his plans. 



9/2/99. 



W. T. T. D. 



Adbendum C— Copy of a draft of a letter in the 

 hand-writing of George Bentham, Esq., C.M.G., from 

 internal evidence addressed to the Right Hon. Edward 

 Henry, 15th Earl of Derby, and written some time in 

 the week preceding the 29th July, 1872. 



[copy.] 

 My Lord, — Observing that your Lordship has given 

 notice that you intend to call the attention of the House 

 of Lords to the case of Dr. Hooker on Monday next, I 

 trust that you will excuse the following observations on 

 the part of one who apart from all party feeling in science 

 as politics, has devoted a long life to the cause of natural 

 science, who has for the last fifty years been thoroughly 

 acquainted with the working of continental national 

 botanical institutions, who, himself, took some part in 

 the establishment of the one at Kew, which has now out- 

 rivalled all the continental ones, who has so long enjoyed 

 the intimacy o'f the most eminent foreign botanists as to 

 be fully aware of the appreciation of our success in this 

 department, and who has maintained, and has in this 

 country had constant intercourse with the cultivators of 

 natural science, having been honoured with the Presi- 

 dency of the principal Natural History Society for the 

 last eleven years. The first five or six years of my botanical 

 life were spent on the Continent, and I had there the 

 opportunity of witnessing the benefits to pure science, as 

 well as to its practical application to industrial medical 

 and other social purposes resulting from such national or 

 government establishments as th3 Jardin des Pilantes, 

 at Paris, only not subject to the vacillations and uncer- 

 tainties of those which depend only on private enterprise 

 or voluntary support, and after my return home I could 

 not but feel deeply our absolute deficiency in this respect, 

 the need for such a national establishment becoming daily 

 more apparent with the general progress of our industry, 

 ,1 need which could be by no means supplied by the most 

 flourishino- of our private societies, such as the Linnean 

 and Horticultural. The opportunity long watched for 

 cnme at last. In 1840 a communication from one of the 

 nranches of the then Government reached me as Honorary 

 Secretary of the Horticultural Society, through Dr. Lind- 

 le\-. then Assistant Secretary of the Society, stating that 



it was intended to break up Kew Gardens (then about to> 

 be handed over from the private domain of the Sovereign),, 

 and offering the collections it contained to the Horticul- 

 tural Society. Indignant at such a proposal Dr. Lindley 

 and myself applied to our President, the late Duke of 

 Devonshire, who at once proceeded to the Prime Minister, 

 Lord Melbourne, and had the leas difficulty in convincing, 

 him of the disgrace that would follow such an open dis- 

 couragement of science, and of the advantages which 

 would ensue from the converting Kew Gardens into a 

 National Institution, as Lord Melbourne himself had 

 had no part in the original proposal. Upon this opening, 

 Sir W. Hooker, supported by his friend the Duke of 

 Bedford and others, succeeded in the foundation of such, 

 a national centre for the study and application of botani- 

 cal science as he had long in contemplation, and of 

 which he now accepted the direction at a considerable 

 sacrifice of income. The result fully answered our expec- 

 tations. Kew, under his able management, rapidly rose 

 into an eminence fully acknowlledged by my friends, 

 abroad, and to a practical usefulness equally admitted at 

 home. Observing that several successive Governments, 

 had seen the advantage of leaving the practical details of 

 the management in the hands of so eminently qualified a- 

 director, and believing that such a management respon- 

 sible to the Government of the country, and through, 

 them to the nation at large, was the best securitj' for the 

 permanence of the establishment, more especially as I 

 foresaw a long continuance of the same management in 

 the prospect of its continuance after Sir William's death 

 in the person of his equally eminent son, I thought I could 

 not do better than off'er for its use my own collections and 

 botanical library. The acceptance of these collections was- 

 followed up by various important gifts of a similar descrip- 

 tion, all useful supplements to that unrivalled private- 

 herbarium of Sir William, which he allowed the use of tO' 

 science at large. 



Thirteen years later, having seen that successive Go- 

 vernments had equally appreciated the advantages of 

 submitting all the practical, and as it is were, professional 

 details of the management to the advice and control of so 

 eminently qualified a director, and feeling confident that 

 future Governments would find it their duty to follow a. 

 similar course so long as they were able to secure the 

 services of men of equal competence, I was induced in 

 1854 to offer my own botanical collections, accumulated 

 during 35 years, together with a working botanical library 

 of above 1,000 volumes, to the national establishment of 

 Kew, as the one which gave the greatest security for its 

 being maintained, extended, and applied to the use of 

 science. It was hoped at the same time that this would 

 be a nucleus which would attract other similar donations,, 

 and that ultimately the whole might become amalgamated 

 with the still more important collections of Sir W. Hooker 

 as one great national Museum, Herbarium, and Library,, 

 forming an indispensable adjunct to the Gardens them- 

 seles, a hope which the subsequent history of Kew up tO' 

 recent events has fully realised. 



After eleven more years (in 1865) Sir W. Hooker died,, 

 and during the unexpected delay that occurred in the ap- 

 pointment of his successor I received through a friend 

 a private communication to the purport that some mem- 

 bers of the Government had a strong objection to any- 

 thing that had the appearance of a hereclitaiy claim to 

 appointment under Government, and asking me whether 

 I would accept this one if offered to me. To this I at 

 once replied that independently of the claims which Dr. 

 Hooker's long trairiing, and the practical part he had for 

 some years taken in the management, might have given 

 him, his scientific eminence, superior even to that of his- 

 father, his administrative abilities, and h':s social quali- 

 fications were so generally acknowledged that the super. 

 seding him on this occasion would be received with the- 

 greatest disfavour, and would be seriously detrimental to- 

 the establishment, and that it was thus my great desire 

 to promote his nomination by every means in my power. 

 Dr. Hooker was approached ; indeed, I believe that there 

 was fortunately no real wish to supersede him, and under 

 his direction the yearly increasing efficiency and pros- 

 perity of the institution confided to his care has been 

 evident to all who have had communication with it, and 

 fully acknowledged by all my foreign friends. I could 

 not but feel tempted to congratulate myself on having 

 from the first contributed in some degree towards the- 

 securing it for the nation. 



Under these circumstances your Lordship will readUy 

 understand the painful feelings with which I have wit- 

 nessed the petty annoyances and vexations to which Dr. 

 Hooker has been subject for the last twelvemonth, which 



