THE REV. PROFESSOR J. S. HENSLOW AS ECOLOGIST. 221 



He himself was most anxious to travel as a botanist ; but the plans 

 suggested for carrying out his wishes fell through. 



As Professor of Botany his lectures were characterized by great 

 lucidity and profusely illustrated by his own made diagrams and 

 plenty of flowers. He invariably made it an imperative rule to appeal 

 to the eye as well as to the ear, and always insisted upon the examination 

 of the flowers being practically done by the students themselves under 

 his own eye during the lecture. 



With regard to his own studies, he took up hybridization experi- 

 ments, and worked out the anatomy of the hybrid foxglove Digitalis 

 purpurea x lutea.i 



Teratology, or the study of " monstrous " conditions of plants, also 

 claimed his attention, e.g., by his study of the malformed mignonette. 

 He also paid much attention to the principles of phyllotaxis ; and also 

 to the variations in the leaves of Paris quadrifolia as well as the cotyle- 

 dons of the sycamore; he was thus a pioneer in the modern study of 

 " Biometry." 



When he left Cambridge in 1839 for Hitcham Eectory, Suffolk, he 

 still pursued various branches of botanical study, as well as experi- 

 mental work; for instance, he tested the heredity of " weeping " in 

 the ash, and found it only lasted for two or three years at most. 



Parasitic fungi of wheat invited his attention, and he discovered that 

 the black " mildew " proceeded from the same mycelium as the pre- 

 ceding red " rust," a fact not previously known. He did not, however, 

 accept the statements of the farmers of Suffolk, that the piperage " 

 bush or Barberry was the cause of the rust; because the Aecidium on 

 the leaves of that plant is totally different in form. Nevertheless we 

 now know there was some truth in the farmers' belief ! 



As Ecology embraces the study of soils as affecting plants, he paid 

 great attention to this matter, and induced the farmers to try experi- 

 ments with ingredients recomm-ended by Liebig. He also delivered 

 series of lectures to the farmers on the best methods of improving their 

 farms. These were subsequently published as " Letters to Farmers." 



When at Felixstowe in the forties t he discovered the now well- 

 known * ' Ooprolite ' ' bed of phosphate nodules ; and it was due to his 

 bringing them to the notice of Sir, then Mr., J. B. Lawes, that they 

 became a source of great commercial value to all owners of land con- 

 taining the pebbles in Suffolk. He also made known the phosphatic 

 nodules of the stratum called the " Greensand " by geologists, near 

 Cambridge. This was a similar source of phosphate of lime for the 

 cultivation of field crops. 



It was my father who recommended Dabwin as naturalist for the 

 Beagle. Although the dawn of evolution broke upon Darwin's mind 



* I remember Sedgwick in 1855 alluding to a somewhat crude geological 

 diagram, saying that he much regretted he had not his friend Henslow's skill 

 as an artist. 



t Trans. Camb. Phil. Soc. 



X In those days (1843) Felixstowe, as now known, did not exist. There 

 were only ten houses, mainly of wood, for summer visitors, and the Bath 

 Hotel. The former were burnt down. 



VOL. XXXVIII. Q 



