564  London  Botanic  Gardens.  { 
during  Alton's  period  of  office,  when  Francis  Masson  was  sent  to 
the  Cape  in  1772,  remaining  there  three  years.  It  is  to  one  of  these 
early  collectors,  David  Nelson,  assistant  botanist  on  Cook's  third 
voyage  (1776-1779),  that  we  are  indebted  for  the  specimen  on 
which  the  extensive  genus  Eucalyptus  was  founded  by  L'Heritier. 
In  1789  William  Alton  published  his  Hortus  Kewensis  or  cata- 
logue of  plants  growing  at  Kew.  This  work,  which  was  the  fore- 
runner of  the  present  elaborate  hand-lists  of  plants  grown  at  Kew, 
contains  descriptions  of  5.500  species,  classified  according  to  the 
Linnean  system. 
In  connection  with  Aiton's  Hortus  Kezvensis  it  is  worthy  of  note 
that  the  name  of  Sir  Joseph  Banks  is  of  the  most  frequent  occur- 
rence in  it ;  a  fact  which  reminds  us  of  the  influence  that  this  inde- 
fatigable patron  of  natural  science  wielded  at  Kew  during  the  latter 
part  of  the  eighteenth  century  and  at  the  beginning  of  the  nine- 
teenth. Under  the  Princess  Augusta's  control  of  the  Gardens,  John 
Stuart,  third  Earl  of  Bute,  had  been  her  scientific  advisor,  and  had 
taken  an  active  part  in  the  botanical  development  of  Kew. 
George  III,  after  the  death  of  his  mother,  the  Princess  Augusta,  in 
1784,  fostered  this  development,  and  eventually  bought  the  freehold 
of  Kew  House  and  its  gardens  from  the  Dowager  Countess  of 
Essex.  Until  the  death  of  this  monarch  in  1820,  Sir  Joseph  Banks 
occupied  a  similar  position  to  that  previously  held  by  Lord  Bute 
(who  had  fallen  out  of  favor  with  George  III),  and  became,  virtually, 
director  of  Kew.  Under  his  direction  the  gardens  enjoyed  a  period 
of  exceptional  activity,  and  became  a  centre  of  botanical  exploration 
and  horticultural  experiment  unparalleled  before  or  since. 
William  Townsend  Aiton  succeeded  to  the  post  which  his  father, 
William  Aiton,  had  so  ably  filled,  and  published  a  second  edition  of 
the  Hortus  Kewensis  in  18 13.  The  efficiency  of  Kew,  however,  was 
mainly  dependent  upon  the  direction  of  Sir  Joseph  Banks,  stimulated 
by  the  interest  which  George  III  took  in  his  domains  at  Richmond 
and  Kew.  When  the  King  became  permanently  insane,  in  18 10,  a 
retrograde  movement  set  in  which  continued  for  the  next  thirty 
years.  Sir  Joseph  Banks  and  King  George  III  both  died  in  1820, 
and  during  the  two  succeeding  decades  after  their  deaths,  Kew 
practically  ceased  to  have  any  standing  as  a  scientific  institution,  and 
its  collections  were  dismembered,  the  most  valuable  of  them  being 
deposited  in  the  British  Museum. 
