94 
EDITORIAL. 
last  communication  was  in  the  31st  volume,  July,  1859.  These  essays  re- 
late to  the  acid  of  the  tomato,  the  fat  of  capsicum,  the  action  of  chromic 
acid  on  volatile  oils,  the  coloring  principle  of  red  sandal  wood,  to  various 
pharmaceutical  preparations,  to  the  sale  of  poisons,  to  the  action  of  ozone 
on  the  volatile  oils,  etc. 
Dr.  Plummer  was  a  consistent  and  influential  member  of  the  Society  of 
Friends,  and  in  his  progress  through  life  was  governed  by  the  conscientious 
convictions  of  a  thinking  mind  as  to  his  duties,  religious,  professional  and 
social.  He  was  so  strongly  opposed  to  show  or  ostentation  as  regarded 
his  acquirements  a3  in  this  to  be  almost  eccentric,  and  declined  several 
proffered  professorships  in  medical  schools,  where  he  might  have  given  a 
useful  vent  to  his  large  accumulations  of  knowledge  in  the  medical  sciences. 
Prof.  Lindley. — The  death  of  Dr.  John  Lindley,  the  distinguished 
Professor  of  Botany  in  University  College,  was  announced  on  the  3d 
inst.  Dr.  Lindley  was  born  on  the  5th  of  February,  1799,  at  Catton,  near 
Norwich,  where  his  father  was  proprietor  of  a  large  nursery  garden. 
After  leaving  the  Grammar  School  of  Norwich,  he  devoted  his  attention 
to  botanical  science.  In  1819,  he  published  a  translation  of  Richard's 
Analyse  du  Fruit,  and  in  1820  a  work  entitled  Monographia  Rosarum, 
in  which  he  described  several  new  species  of  roses.  About  the  same  pe- 
riod he  contributed  to  the  Transactions  of  the  Linncen  Society  various 
papers  on  botanical  subjects.  Some  time  afterwards  he  proceeded  to 
London,  where  he -became  Assistant  Secretary  to  the  Horticultural  So- 
ciety, and  was  engaged  by  Mr.  Loudon  to  write  the  descriptive  portion 
of  his  Encyclopaedia  of  Plants,  the  merit  of  which,  as  a  botanical  work, 
was  entirely  due  to  him.  as  was  stated  in  the  preface.  The  Encyclopae- 
dia was  completed  in  1829.  In  the  same  year  he  was  appointed  Profes- 
sor of  Botany  at  the  London  University.  At  this  period  the  Linnasn 
system  was  almost  universally  followed  by  English  botanists.  It  is  one 
of  the  chief  merits  of  Dr.  Lindley  that  he  early  saw  the  necessity  of  su- 
perseding the  artificial  by  the  natural  classification  of  plants.  In  an 
essay  on  this  subject,  published  in  his  Introduction  to  the  Natural  System 
of  Botany,  published  in  1830,  he  showed  very  clearly  what  the  advanta- 
ges of  this  system  were,  and  thus  paved  the  way  for  its  general  adoption 
in  England.  Two  years  later  he  published  the  Introduction  to  System- 
atic and  Physiological  Botany,  and  a  Synopsis  of  the  British  Flora,  in 
which  our  indigenous  plants  were  arranged  and  described  for  the  first 
time  according  to  the  natural  system.  In  a  Natural  System  of  Botany % 
published  in  1836,  Dr.  Lindley  took  new  views  of  botanical  classification, 
and  proposed  a  new  nomenclature  for  the  families  of  plants.  Ten  years 
later,  his  great  work,  The  Vegetable  Kingdom,  was  published.  This 
work,  the  most  elaborate,  that  had  appeared  on  systematic  botany,  gave  a 
description  of  all  the  families  of  plants,  and  more  especially  of  those 
useful  to  man.  It  gave  very  extended  lists  of  the  genera,  and  was  gen- 
erally recognized  as  one  of  the  most  important  contributions  which  had 
at  that  time  appeared  on  systematic  botany.  While  engaged  in  writing 
these  works,  Dr.  Lindley  was  most  diligently  employed,  as  a  practical 
botanist,  in  describing  new  species,  on  which  he  wrote  a  large  number  of 
papers  contributed  to  botanical  publications.  In  1841,  he  became  editor 
of  the  Gardeners'  Chronicle,  a  weekly  publication,  which  he  conducted 
with  great  ability.  In  1860,  he  was  appointed  examiner  in  the  Univer- 
sity of  London.  He  was  a  Ph.  D.  of  Munich,  and  a  Fellow  of  the 
Royal  Society,  of  which,  in  1858,  he  received  the  medal  as  a  reward  for 
his  services  to  botanical  science. —  Chemist  and  Druggist. 
