670 
PRESIDENT’S address. 
led me on in the pursuit of our favourite science . . . while 
with pleasure I now revisit the haunts of my youth ... it is 
with double satisfaction I recollect and gratefully acknowledge 
how much of my earliest progress is to be attributed to you.” 
Loudon says that Smith “ for thirty years studied the willows 
in Mr. Crowe’s garden along with that botanist ” 11 ; this is 
incorrect, as is proved in “ English Flora,” Vol. IV., p. 164, by 
Smith’s own statement, “ full thirty years have I laboured at 
this task, ten of them under the instructive auspices of my 
late friend Mr. Crowe.” This period of ten years is proved 
by Smith’s herbarium at Burlington House, for all the 
specimens of willows from Crowe’s garden were collected in 
1800 or later. James Crowe had been his friend for thirty 
years till 1807, but the “thirty years” here quoted were those 
of Smith’s residence in Norwich from 1796 till his death in 
1828. 
In “ The New Election Budget,” “ See’st thou a man that 
is hasty in his words,” refers to Mr. Crowe." T. J. Woodward 
had formed a similar opinion of him ; for he writes from 
Bungay on April 23rd, 1785, to James Smith: — “He does 
not like anyone should make a discovery but himself as you 
well know ... I should beg to be excused consulting Crowe, 
as he is so unwilling to hear any difference of opinion . . . 
Mr. Crowe says he knew the Arenaria to be laricifolia, and 
not verna, long since. Do you believe this ? ” To appreciate 
the full effect of Crowe’s arguments, we must take into account 
his “stentorian voice.” 8 
In 1808 Professor W. D. Peck writes to Dr. Smith: — “I 
often go with you to visit the Salicetum of your late friend 
Mr. Crowe, see with pleasure the stream which flows by it, 
adorned with Nymphcea ; visit in my way Verbascum 
pulverulentum, and collect the Scabious in passing through 
the churchyard.” 6 
After Mr. Crowe’s death, Dr. and Mrs. Smith continued 
the friendship with Mrs. Crowe; and in August, 1811, after 
one of Dr. Smith’s severe illnesses, they were the guests of 
Mrs. Crowe at Lakenham, instead of going to Lowestoft. 
