278 THE ORCHID REVIEW. __ [Nov.-Dkc., 1919. 
Ss 
ILLIAM SWAN.—This able and experienced Orchidist passed away 
at Jamnagar Lodge, Staines, on October 3rd last, at the age of 78 
years. Mr. Swan commenced his horticultural career in the nursery of 
Messrs. Hugh Low & Co., at Upper Clapton, in the early fifties, having for 
a co-worker his old schoolfellow, Mr. Harry A. Barnard, who remained with 
the firm until its dissolution, and then went to Enfield with Messrs. Stuart 
Low & Co. 
The Orchids at Upper Clapton were then in poor condition, and Mr. 
Low decided to improve them, installing a new foreman and_ three 
assistants—German, Swiss, and French—with Mr. Swan, then a lad, as 
general helper. The plants were repotted, and the collection was extended 
by importations from Borneo, Burma, India, and the Straits Settlements. 
These were brought by slow sailing vessels, which in those days had to go 
round by the Cape, so that many of the plants arrived dead or in poor 
condition; the cases, moreover, generally being infested with cockroaches. 
The circumstances of these’ early days have been the subject of some 
amusing recollections by the deceased. 
After two years at Upper Clapton, Mr. Swan eed the service of 
John Day, Esq., of Lower Tottenham, then a great lover and grower of 
ferns, though there were also a few Orchids, and it was when fetching a rare 
fern for Mr. Day from Messrs. Loddiges’ Nursery at Hackney that he was 
shown the fine collection of Orchids grown there, and was much impressed 
with some finely-flowered plants of Aérides odoratum that were grown in 
baskets and stood about the floor. After three years’ experience at Lower 
Tottenham he went to Bowes Manor, Southgate, as general foreman, and 
then occupied himself with landscape work at Strood Park, Kent, for a 
season, after which he returned to the service of Mr. Day, who in 1858 had 
moved to High Cross, Tottenham, and after building suitable houses, had 
taken up the culture of Orchids on an extensive scale, Mr. Swan being 
second gardener, under Mr. Stone. There were excellent opportunities for 
OBITUARY. S| 
4) 
improvement at High Cross, and Mr. Swan speaks with enthusiasm of the - 
splendid specimens of Aérides, Saccolabium, Vanda, and Phalznopsis 
then grown there. He again stayed three years, and has recounted how 
during three severe winters he often stayed until midnight, aud even until 
two or three o'clock in the morning, in order to keep the boiler fire working 
properly, and how, with the help of lantern or candle, he occupied his 
- Spare time making pencil drawings of some of the Orchid flowers. He 
also recalls a terrific storm which visited the district, during which nearly 
; 
) 
| 
