2 ANNIVERSARY ADDRESS. 
L. H. J. Maclean, elected 1881; R. A. A. Morehead, elected 
1850 ; H. Phillips, elected 1856 ; T. W. Shepherd, elected 1881 ; 
H. Arding Thomas, elected 1876. 
George Bentham is a name which can never be forgotten so long: 
as Australian botany is studied, and some short notes of his life 
will be interesting. He was born at Stoke, near Portsmouth, on 
September 22, 1800, and in 1805 his father, General Bentham, was 
sent to St. Petersburgh by the English Government, and there 
the family resided until 1807, during which time the future 
botanist acquired some knowledge of the Russian language. 
Returning to England with his family, General Bentham thought 
it best to educate his family by tutors, and hence George Bentham 
never went to any school. After some years the family removed 
to France, and had a large farm, where everything was done to 
improve the methods of cultivation, and for a number of years 
George Bentham had to give his undivided attention to the 
management of the farm ; nevertheless it was here that he acquired 
a taste forthe study of botany, which later on was to absorb all 
his attention. Taking up one day a book on botany, belonging to 
his mother, he was looking through it, and became very much 
interested in the methodical arrangement of plants, and was 
induced to try if, by the aid of the book, he could find out what 
the first plant he met with was. Succeeding in this after some 
difficulty, his interest was aroused, and he worked steadily on in his 
spare hours until he was induced to devote his life to the study of 
botany. In 1826 he was elected a Fellow of the Linnean Society, 
and ever after took an active part in it, and was made President 
in 1863, and resigned in 1877. By the publication of his first 
important work, on the “ Labiatarum Genera et Species, 1832 to 
1836,” he made his mark in the scientific world. In 1854 he 
went to live in London, for the purpose of devoting himself to 
systematic work at Kew, and this work he continued until his 
death. Here he undertook the Flora of Hong Kong, which was 
the inauguration of the Colonial Floras which have from time to 
time a issued under the auspices of the authorities at Kew. 
