REFERENCE BOOKS ON ENGLISH GARDENING LITERATURE. 



125 



the Portraits of English Authors on Gardening," with bio- 

 graphical notices. This work is now and then met with bound 

 up with " A History of English Gardening," by George W. 

 Johnson, and published about the same date, although by 

 different publishers. 



1821. Hon. and Rev. W. Herbert, author of the " Amaryl- 

 lidaceae " and a remarkable paper on " Hybridisation among 

 Vegetables." Herbert was " a Darwinian before Darwin," and 

 his observations are often strikingly original. He was a worthy 

 successor to Bradley and Fairchild, who had treated on hybridity 

 a century or so before his time. 



1831. Sir J. Paxton. Paxton was a young gardener at 

 Chiswick, where he deservedly obtained the notice of the Duke 

 of Devonshire, who made him superintendent of the then cele- 

 brated gardens at Chatsworth. He was afterwards knighted for 

 his share in the great exhibition of 1851, which in part is now 

 existent as the Crystal Palace. 



The first edition of his " Gardeners' Dictionary " was pub- 

 lished in 1840, and his " Magazine of Botany " was a well-known 

 illustrated periodical of its time. 



1850-85. Thomas Moore, F.L.S., succeeded R. Fortune as 

 curator of the Apothecaries' garden at Chelsea. He was an 

 authority on ferns, and acted with Dr. R. Hogg and the late Rev. 

 M. J. Berkeley on the Chiswick or Garden Committee of the 

 Royal Horticultural Society. He also acted with Dr. M. T. 

 Masters for some years as co-editor of the " Gardeners' Chronicle," 

 and as an authority on garden vegetation had a high reputation, 

 He edited " The Florist and Pomologist " for many years, and 

 also the second edition of Thompson's "Gardeners' Assistant" 

 (1877) for Messrs. Blackie and Co. Moore also edited the 

 " Treasury of Botany," a valuable work of reference of its kind. 



1859. Charles Darwin, F.R.S. Although a biologist rather 

 than a horticulturist, it would be difficult to name a worker who 

 has done more to ennoble and enlighten the labours of the 

 gardener and farmer than Darwin. His views on plant life and 

 evolution cleared away much that was previously misty and 

 obscure. The "mules" and " bastard " progeny once despised 

 by some botanists as the cause of confusion were shown by Darwin 

 to be really links in the great chain of that continual upward 

 and onward progress so far as plant and animal life is concerned. 



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