Other volumes of particular interest to the development 

 of the U.S. Botanic Garden are volumes 15 and 18, which 

 discuss the Phanerogamia (seeds and flowering plants) col- 

 lected by the Expedition; 15 volume 16, which is devoted to 

 the ferns that were studied; 16 and volume 17, which includes 

 descriptions of the lichens, fungi, mosses, and algae Wilkes 

 encountered. 17 A portion of volume 17 is also devoted to 

 the seed plants collected in the Pacific Northwest. 



The Wilkes Expedition is interesting from a literary point 

 of view as well. The determined and domineering Wilkes 

 is said to have served as a model for Captain Ahab in 

 Herman Melville's classic Moby-Dick. 18 



AMERICA'S RESPONSE TO THE EXPEDITION 



Despite the importance of the Expedition, Wilkes and his 

 men received far from a hero's welcome upon their return. 

 The reasons for this reaction are complex and reflected reac- 



15 Volume 15 was authored by botanist Asa Gray. In a June 1848 letter 

 to John Torrey, a well known botanist of the period, Gray explained that 

 he accepted the task on the understanding that part of the required 

 research could be performed in one of the established herbariums abroad. 

 The work involved describing, and in many cases identifying, the dried 

 plant specimens collected during the Expedition. Gray felt this task could 

 only be accomplished by studying the collections abroad, the quality of 

 which were not equaled in the United States. He predicted that the work 

 would take approximately five years to complete. Wilkes at once accepted 

 his terms. Jane Loring Gray, ed., Letters of Asa Gray, New York: Lenox 

 Hill Pub. & Dist. Co., 1893, p. 359. Gray actually completed volume 15 

 in 1854. Volume 18, also written by Gray, was, for a variety of reasons, 

 never published. The manuscript is held by the Gray Herbarium at 

 Harvard University. For background on Asa Gray see footnote 45. See 

 also Bartlett, Reports of the Wilkes Expedition, pp. 664-673. 



16 Volume 16, entitled Filices, was written by James Brackenridge. A 

 summary of this volume is found in Bartlett, Reports of the Wilkes 

 Expedition, pp. 673-679. 



17 Volume 17 was edited by Asa Gray. Four sections of the volume 

 were written by four different authors, none of whom actually were 

 members of the Wilkes Expedition. The fifth, devoted to the seed col- 

 lections, was prepared by John Torrey. For a summary of this volume 

 see Ibid., pp. 679-682. 



18 David Jaffe, Literary Detective Harpoons a Whale of a Tale, Potomac 

 Magazine (Washington Post), June 2, 1963, pp. 18-19; and David Jaffe, 

 The Stormy Petrel and the Whale: Some Origins of Moby-Dick, Washing- 

 ton: University Press of America, 1982, pp. 7-38. 



22 



