XV 
George Bentham , F.R.S. 
estate of 2,000 acres, which he had purchased, near Montpellier, 
and the management of which he made over to his now only- 
son, the eldest having died some years previously. The 
estate consisted of farms and vineyards, to the improvement 
of which George devoted himself with alacrity and success. 
They became very profitable, and throughout the remainder 
of his life in England an excellent St. George Burgundy (the 
produce of the Restinalieres estate), and a rare and luscious 
Lunel from a neighbouring vineyard, were familiar to the 
guests at his table. All his spare time was devoted to 
botanical excursions in the Cevennes and Pyrenees, and to 
making a French translation of his uncle’s Essay on Nomen- 
clature and Classification. Here, too, he wrote his first 
important work, c Essai sur la Nomenclature et Classification 
des Arts et Sciences,’ which was published in Paris, and which 
established his position as an acute analyzer, clear expositor, 
and cautious reasoner. Half a century after its appearance it 
was praised by Professor Stanley Jevons in his History of the 
Sciences. 
In 1823 G. Bentham was sent to England for the purpose 
of obtaining agricultural implements and information as to 
improved methods of farming. On his arrival in London he 
was well received by his uncle, and introduced into the best 
literary and scientific society of the capital. He was invited 
to the breakfasts and receptions of Sir Joseph Banks, and 
studied in his library and herbarium, where he commenced a 
life-long friendship with their curator, Robert Brown, ‘ Botani- 
corum facile princeps.’ There, and at the Horticultural 
and Linnean Societies, he met the elite of the naturalists 
of the day. From London he made a tour into Scotland, 
where he was hospitably entertained by the Professors of 
Botany in Edinburgh (Graham) and Glasgow (Hooker) 1 , and 
1 It was from this visit that Bentham was wont to date his permanent adherence 
to Botany. I, then six years old, remember him and the enthusiasm with which 
he received from my father a collection of Alpine Scotch plants, the first 
examples of the Northern European Flora he had ever seen. The intimate 
friendship between my father and Bentham, which lasted forty-two years, 
dates from this period. 
b 
