134 MEMOIR OF ALFEED SMEE. [Chap. XII. 



CHAPTER XII. 



1876 TO 1877. 



Book on Fishing — Hard-working — Letters from abroad — Letters to the ' Times,' 

 ' Standard,' and the ' G-ardeners' Chronicle ' — His death, January 11, 1877, 

 aged fifty-eight — Buried ai St. Mary's, Beddington, within sight of the 

 garden, January 16, 1877. 



In the beginning of the year 1876 we have seen Mr. Smee discussing 

 the heads of legislation which he had drawn up for the regulation 

 of sewage grounds ; this was immediately followed by his taking 

 a great interest in the fresh facts relating to the potato disease 

 (see p. 35, also the Appendix, No. XV.c). He was also interesting 

 himself in the Colorado beetle, and was carrying on a correspon- 

 dence in America and Germany, finding out all that was known 

 of the devastation and habits of the insect. He had himself 

 obtained a dead Colorado beetle from a friend, and had had a 

 woodcut made of it. Besides this, in the midst of his other 

 business, he was, in spare moments before breakfast and after a 

 late dinner, busy writing a new book on Fishing. Much was 

 written ; still the finishing touches of the master hand were re- 

 quired for those chapters which were otherwise completed. This 

 book was to have been copiously illustrated ; and from some of 

 the woodcuts which have come under my notice, and from frag- 

 ments of the manuscript which my father read to me from time to 

 time, I should say that this work on Fishing bade fair to rival 

 its sister book, ' My Garden.' But this work was not to be com- 

 pleted; and as Longfellow tells us : 



" Labour with what zeal we will. 

 Something still remains undone. 

 Something uncompleted still 

 Waits the rising of the sun." 



My brother has kindly offered me one of the illustrations for this 

 work. It is a woodcut taken from a water-colour drawing, of 



