i86s0 CHILDREN AND PARENTS. 223 



the ' Fertilization of Orchids,' and I think I have a German 



copy. 



Could you spare me a photograph of yourself ? I should 

 much like to possess one. 



C. Darwin to J. D. Hooker. 



Down, Thursday, 27th [Sept., 1865J. 

 My dear Hooker, — I had intended writing this morning 

 to thank Mrs. Hooker most sincerely for her last and several 

 notes about you, and now your own note in your hand has 

 rejoiced me. To walk between five and six miles is splendid, 

 with a little patience you must soon be well. I knew you had 

 been very ill, but I hardly knew how ill, until yesterday, when 

 Bentham (from the Cranworths*) called here, and I was able 

 to see him for ten minutes. He told me also a little about 

 the last days of your father ; f I wish I had known your father 

 better, my impression is confined to his remarkably cordial, 

 courteous, and frank bearing. I fully concur and understand 

 what you say about the difference of feeling in the loss of a 

 father and child. I do not think any one could love a father 

 much more than I did mine, and I do not believe three or 

 four days ever pass without my still thinking of him, but his 

 death at eighty-four caused me nothing of that insufferable 

 grief \ which the loss of poor dear Annie caused. And this 



* Robert Rolfe, Lord Cranworth, and Lord Chancellor of England, 

 lived at Holwood, near Down. 



f Sir William Hooker ; b. 1785, d. 1865. He took charge of the 

 Royal Gardens at Kew, in 1840, when they ceased to be the private gar- 

 dens of the Royal Family. In doing so, he gave up his professorship at 

 Glasgow — and with it half of his income. He founded the herbarium and 

 library, and within ten years he succeeded in making the gardens the first 

 in the world. It is, thus, not too much to say that the creation of the es- 

 tablishment at Kew is due to the abilities and self-devotion of Sir William 

 Hooker. While, for the subsequent development of the gardens up to 

 their present magnificent condition, the nation must thank Sir Joseph 

 Hooker, in whom the same qualities are so conspicuous. 



% I may quote here a passage from a letter of November, 1863. It was 



