THOMSON AS COLLABOEATOE 357 
Thomson and I [writes Hooker to Bentham, October 10, 
1852] are not at all likely to quarrel about the limits of the 
species, which I hold that we should do if we were improper 
lum'pers quite as much as if we were hair-splitters. 
But the spade work was very heavy. By November, 
we have done a vast deal to the Malayan Flora, but not 
nearly got through the Khassya bundles. Thomson finds 
the arrangement of his own N.W. parts, which is not yet in 
Nat. Ords ! a much heavier task than he dreamt of. We are 
working steadily on, however. 
But Thomson was constantly being called away by the 
claims of ailing relations ; his powers of persevering concen- 
tration had been sapped by much illness in India, and at the 
turn of the year 1853-4, Hooker writes in despondent mood 
to Bentham : 
He cannot work except under the very strongest stimulus, 
and every advantage being put under his nose, — it was so 
in India, there was no inducing him to study a plant though 
so keen and admirable a collector. ... As to Flora Indica, 
I have no idea when Part I will be out, and between Thom- 
son's excessive scrupulosity, his natural slowness, and his 
matchless 'procrastination, I see very little chance of its 
appearance under x months. The consequences of working 
by fits and starts tell very heavily, for it requires the same 
work to be gone over again and again. An immense intro- 
duction is nearly written, but also so by fits and starts that 
Mrs. Hooker has to go it all over, and it sometimes takes an 
hour to unravel a page of the MS. I have taken up the 
distribution of my own plants in earnest, and dropped Flora 
Indica altogether as hopeless under present circumstances. 
Nevertheless the book, as has been said, appeared in 1855. 
It is described in a letter to Munro, November 8, 1855 : 
The first volume of Flora Indica is finished and consists 
of 2 parts, 280 pages of introductory matter, and as much of 
description, extending from Eanunculaceae to Fumariaceae ; 
it cost Thomson and me the best part of two years' hard 
labour and will, I hope, prove useful. We have a copy for 
VOL. I 2 a 
