iii 



Mr. Bentham published his " Labiatarum Genera et Species " in 

 1832-36 : his " Scrophularineae Indicae" in 1835. 



In 1829 Mr. Bentham accepted the onerous duties of Honorary- 

 Secretary to the Horticultural Society of London. The Society was, 

 at that time, in very low water ; but with his friend Dr. Lindley's 

 assistance he rescued and brought it into " a nourishing condition, 

 financially and scientifically, which it has never since approached." 

 This connexion with the Horticultural Society necessarily determined 

 somewhat the direction of his botanical work, and led him to the 

 publication of the botanical results of the Douglas and Hartweg 

 explorations in North and Central America and in the United States 

 of Columbia. 



In 1833 Mr. Bentham married the daughter of the late Bight Hon. 

 Sir Harford Brydges, of Boultibrooke, and settled in the following 

 year at his late uncle's house in Queen's Square Place, whence he 

 removed in 1 842 to Pontrilas House, in Herefordshire. It was while 

 resident here that he revised the orders Labiatae, Scrophulariace®, 

 and the Eriogonese for the " Prodromus," besides continuing his 

 publication of the Guiana plants of Schomburgk, and the botanical 

 collections of the voyage of the " Sulphur" (1844). 



In 1836 Mr. Bentham made a tour with the object of visiting the 

 principal herbaria of the Continent, and settled to hard work in Vienna 

 in the autumn of that year. It was here that he prepared his first 

 important work on the Leguminosse (" Leguminosarum Generibas 

 Commentationes "), published in 1840 in the "Annalen des Wiener 

 Museums." He also described, in conjunction with Dr. Endlicher, 

 the Australian novelties brought home by Baron Hiigel, and worked 

 at the Ericeas for the " Prodromus." 



In 1854, finding the maintenance of his herbarium and library too 

 serious a charge, Mr. Bentham contemplated, on his final removal to 

 London, abandoning botanical work and presenting his collections and 

 books to the Royal Gardens, Kew, of which his old and most intimate 

 friend Sir W. J. Hooker was Director. That eminent man, however, 

 by his entreaties and by the offer of the free use of his library and 

 herbarium, prevailed to secure to Systematic Botany the rest of Mr. 

 Bentham's active life. Through his influence the accommodation of 

 a private working room in connexion with the herbaria at Kew was 

 secured for Mr. Bentham, and the course of his future life's work 

 was finally determined by the inauguration of a series of Colonial 

 Floras, of the model of which, the " Flora of the Island of Hong 

 Kong" — so remarkable in the number of forms peculiar, or at that 

 t : me supposed so to be, to that small island — Mr. Bentham was the 

 author. The " Flora Hongkongensis " was published in 1861. A 

 short time before Mr. Bentham had published, for the use of 

 beginners, an admirable flora of the British Islands, a work in 



