OBITUARY. 
45 
great energy and perseverance. He would be up and away at two or three o’clock in 
the morning, and walk many miles before daylight to his botanising grounds, fill his 
vasculum, and get back by midday to dispense the medicines ordered that morning for 
his father’s patients, and then proceed to lay out and dry his plants. Such energy could 
not but be rewarded with perfect success, and lay the foundation for that honourable 
and useful career which marked his whole life. 
He was subsequently in practice on his own account in Wellclose Square, where he 
made the discovery which led to the adoption of close glazed cases for the transmission 
of plants from one part of the world to another, and which have not only been the means 
of enriching our conservatories with the choicest productions of nature, but of introduc¬ 
ing tea-plants for cultivation into Assam and the cinchonas into India, either of which 
facts is sufficient to immortalise his name as a great benefactor to his race. 
It was in Wellclose Square also where those delightful evening parties met in the 
pursuit of microscopic science, which afterwards led to the formation of the Microscopical 
Society of London, and of which he was for many years the treasurer. 
He was a good classical scholar, and had a wonderful memory for words,—retained to 
the last,—which no doubt greatly facilitated his acquirement of a very extensive know¬ 
ledge of plants. His garden at Clapham Rise, where he had resided for many years, 
was not one to attract ordinary flower-growers, it being in the eyes of most a mere wil¬ 
derness ; but to himself it was a constant source of the greatest enjoyment, which he 
took care that all and every one, rich or poor, should participate in if they pleased. It 
was crowded with rare hardy plants from both the Old and New World. His knowledge 
of their habits and economic value was very extensive, and nothing delighted him more 
than to get a friend or two with him and talk about them, interspersing his descriptions 
with remarkable anecdotes of great men and botanists whose names were in some way 
connected with his pets. 
Mr. Ward was a very old member of the Apothecaries’ Company, to which he served 
the office of master, and for the last few years of his life was its honoured and esteemed 
treasurer. 
Although in no special manner connected with pharmacy, except in the pursuit of 
his favourite science, botany, we can hardly allow the name of so great and good a man 
to pass without a record, however imperfect, in our Journal. And it may be well that 
our members should know that, in his own quiet way, he was one of the staunchest 
friends of the Pharmaceutical Society. 
To this sketch of the life of Mr. Ward, which has been contributed by an old friend, 
we add the following remarks from the pen of Dr. Hooker, and published in the ‘ Gar¬ 
deners’ Chronicle ’:— 
“Mr. Ward, whom I knew for full thirty years of my life, was as warm and steady a 
friend as I ever possessed ; and it would be difficult to say which of the many excellent 
traits of his estimable character was most worthy of imitation—his love of truth, or his 
appreciation in others of generous qualities far inferior to his own ; his unselfish regard 
for the happiness of those around him; or the absence of all vanity, littleness, -and self- 
love ; or his eager desire to promote the worthy aspirations of the young, and administer 
to the failing faculties of the old. He sought the acquaintance of youths, especially for 
the purpose of fostering the tastes of those who took to natural history, and instilling 
the love of nature into those who did not, with the one object in both cases of render¬ 
ing their lives the happier thereby; and he extended the same solicitude to the poorest 
of the poor with a zeal and singleness of purpose which would have appeared morbid in 
a man of less cultivated tastes or less scientific acquirements. For the welfare of young 
travellers and voyagers he had especial regard, and of these none whom he knew went 
forth in the wide world without some token of his affectionate interest in their career, in 
the shape of a book, a pocket lens, or some useful implement for study or collecting, 
always of the very best possible make, and by the best possible maker. With those 
that would, be kept up a correspondence, which in my own case was, I avow, the most 
useful and pleasant I ever enjoyed; his letters, written in a small and beautiful running 
hand, contained, besides the scientific gossip of the day, information of all kinds that 
he thought could interest or be valuable to the traveller, together with good manly 
counsel, and a hearty interest in the recipient’s success, which is the best stimulus to 
work, and the best cheer under circumstances of difficulty and danger. 
“During the whole period that I knew him, and I believe for many years before, his 
