
          last 2 of my courses in Glasgow & more recently 
by the awful task of my removal. Books (about 
6000 vols.) herbarium (now occupying 7 apartments)
& furniture of every description. All 
came by sea & then was [crossed out: transporting] transhipped 
from the Thames, which conveyed it to 
within a very short distance of my residence. 
I had all this to do & the house 
to paper, paint & furnish, with no one, not 
even my own family to assist me. Happily 
all is now comfortably arranged, & now 
besides the increase of my herbarium, I have 
another important object at heart, the increase 
of the botanical collections of the 
Royal Botanic Garden. It is really a noble 
place & boasts some noble houses & many, 
very many fine plants, as Mr. Tuckerman 
will tell you: extremely rich in Australian 
& Cape plants, but lamentably poor in the 
plants of many countries, even of N. [North] America, 
though it did once possess the best collection 
of them in Europe. There have died away, 
& nobody cared to renew them. This it must 
be my duty to do, & at as little expense to the 
country as possible (for the government now 
pays the expenses of the establishment & to 
throw open in the most liberal manner daily 
to the whole public). Our income is tolerable, 
but I have an immense deal to provide for in 
the garden, & feel it is my duty, without being 
niggardly, to be oeconomical. Gifts are already 
        