XXXil BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES 
as a result, two were sent, the one under Captain John 
Ross in search of the North-West Passage ; the other, which 
included Franklin, to sail northwards’ by the east coast of 
Greenland. 
He was on several occasions invited to stand for Parlia- 
ment, but always declined, preferring to devote his entire 
time to his duties as President of the Royal Society, and 
to the innumerable functions it entailed. 
It is sometimes said that Banks viewed with strong 
disapproval the formation of other societies for the pursuit 
of natural science. This was certainly so in the case of the 
Astronomical Society, which he considered would seriously 
decrease the importance of that over which he himself 
presided. But this was only because he conceived the 
objects of the former association to be so intimately con- 
nected with those of the Royal Society that there would 
not be sufficient scope for both. On the other hand, he 
was one of the founders of the Linnean Society in 1788, 
and took an even more prominent part in the formation of 
the Royal Institution in 1799. 
In March 1779 he married Dorothea, daughter of 
William Western Hugessen, Esq., of Provender, Kent. In 
1782 Solander died, and from that time onward Banks 
became more and more absorbed in the duties of the Royal 
Society, and acted as chief counsellor in all scientific matters 
to the king. In this capacity he had virtual control of the 
Royal Gardens at Kew, then under the cultural care of 
the elder Aiton, where were raised the plants produced by 
seeds brought home by himself, and so many of the novelties 
described in lHeéritier’s Sertwm <Anglicum, Aiton’s Hortus 
Kewensis, and other botanical works. It was due to his 
indefatigable exertions and representations that the Royal 
Gardens at Kew were raised to the position of the first in 
the world, and that collectors were sent to the West Indies, 
the Cape Colonies, and Australia, to send home living plants 
and seeds, and herbaria, for the Royal Gardens. He kept 
Francis Bauer (who, and his brother Ferdinand, were the most 
accomplished botanical artists of the century) at Kew con- 
