THE HERBARIUM AND LIBRARY 113 
Turner and 
Gerard. 
Berthelet, printer and bookbinder to Henry VIII., in 1535. It may 
be mentioned here that the first English edition of this work was 
printed by Wynkyn de Worde about 1494, and this book was the first 
ever printed on English-made paper. The early illustrations of plants 
were more or less conventional, often partly imaginary productions, 
and no doubt in many cases were the degraded results of copying 
repeatedly, instead of making fresh blocks from the plants them- 
selves. In 1542, however, a work appeared which is remarkable for 
its very fine woodcuts of plants. This is the De Historia Stirpium 
of Leonhard Fuchs, a German botanist, who is commemorated in the 
well-known fuchsia of our gardens. An excellent example of this 
work is in the Library. 
Among the more notable of other pre-Linnaean authors whose 
works are at Kew may be mentioned William Turner, known as the 
“ Father of English Botany,” whose “ Herbal ” (1551-68) 
contains some fine examples of initial letters ; John 
Gerard, who had a garden in Holbom and was the 
author of a famous “ Herball,” published first in 1597 ; and John 
Parkinson, Paradisi in Sole (1629 and 1656) and Theatrum 
Botanicum (1640). Of the numerous publications of R. J. Thornton 
at Kew, the most noteworthy is the sumptuous work entitled 
“ A New Illustration of the Sexual System of Carolus von 
Linnaeus,” dated 1807, an imperial folio containing several portraits 
of celebrities, including some fine ones of Linnaeus, and costly 
coloured engravings of many plants. Thornton in 1811 obtained 
an Act of Parliament to enable him to dispose of his collections 
of paintings, drawings, engravings, etc., by means of a lottery, 
called “ The Royal Botanical Lottery, under the patronage of His 
Royal Highness the Prince Regent.” There were 20,000 tickets 
at two guineas each, and 1,000 prizes said by Thornton to repre- 
sent a total value of £77,000. He died a poor man, so it may be 
assumed that the lottery was not successful. A book extraordinary 
on account of its size is Bateman’s “ Orchidaceae of Mexico and 
Guatemala,” which stands 29I- inches high and is 21 inches broad. 
The fine coloured drawings of orchids are life-size. Only 125 copies 
of the work were issued. “ Floras ” are, as might be expected, 
a strong feature of the Library. These vary very considerably 
in size, value, and importance. By far the largest of all is the 
Flora Brasiliensis, which consists of forty part-volumes in folio, 
Q 
