STAET OF THE FLORA INDICA 355 
devoted to getting ready the materials for the New Zealand 
Flora, so as to clear the field in part at least for the Indian 
work. Though the last boxes of his collections arrived in 
September and * astonished ' his father, to be followed im- 
mediately by Thomas Thomson and his collection, numbering 
twenty-five chests, it was not till March 20, 1852, that he wrote 
to Bentham : 
I have broken bulk with the Indian collections, done all 
the woods (about 500), Palms, Bamboos, and big things, 
and am all ready to plunge into the Haystacks, working in 
the rooms at Kew. 
Some of his Indian results had already been pubhshed 
by the Asiatic Society of Bengal whilst he was in India. One 
folio volume with fine illustrations of the Sikkim Ehododen- 
drons, edited by Sir Wilham from his son's notes, drawings, 
and materials, appeared in successive parts between 1849 
and 1851.-'- Another folio, a volume of illustrations of Hima- 
layan plants from near Darjihng, chiefly collected by him 
on behalf of an Indian friend, Mr. Cathcart, was edited, with 
descriptions by Hooker himself, in 1855. 
But now Dr. Thomson settled hard by and spent a great 
part of the next three years at Kew, completing his ' Travels in 
Western Himalaya and Tibet,' pubhshed in 1852, and working 
side by side with his friend at their common task. His masters, 
the East India Company, encouraged him to work with promises 
of reward if the work were satisfactory, but gave no imme- 
diate help. Nor was assistance forthcoming from the British 
Association. The nebulous hope of bringing out a whole 
Flora of India, however, took solid shape when, on the death 
of his father in 1852, Thomson came into a little money. This 
he promptly devoted to science, paying for the huge volume 
of 581 pages which he and Hooker brought out in 1855, and 
hazarding repayment from * John Company.' The detail of 
this, the first and only volume of their Flora Indica, was so 
full that if the work had been completed on the same scale, 
it would have reached nearly 12,000 pages. 
1 See ante, p. 326. 
