28 Arnoldia 78/5-6 « October 2021 
only were there unforeseen delays but more 
species in newly explored places were discov- 
ered over time, in part as a result of Sargent’s 
own studies. As time went on, Jesup sometimes 
questioned the necessity for including extrane- 
ous, noneconomic species, noting to Sargent, 
“Its completeness in a scientific or botanical 
sense, to my mind is secondary.” !? To Bickmore 
privately, he observed that many tree species, 
“while they may be rare and valuable in a sci- 
entific sense, are useless economically owing 
to the remote and inaccessible districts where 
they grow and the necessary cost of transporta- 
tion to manufacturing centres.” !4 
Sargent nonetheless continued to send col- 
lectors far afield and on special trips for newly 
discovered or rare species in the interest of 
amassing a comprehensive collection. He had 
taken on the project gratis, with an eye toward 
his own long-term interests in American for- 
ests. With the collection’s scientific contribu- 
tions as his priority, Sargent advised Jesup early 
in 1881, “It is not too late for us both to retire 
altogether from the undertaking, which unless 
carried out largely will add neither reputation 
to the Museum, nor credit to the parties most 
interested.”!° The project went on, and fifteen 
years later he emphasized the significance of 
the work to Jesup: “The formation of your Col- 
lection, the publication of my book, and other 
causes have led to an unprecedented activity in 
dendrological exploration and study in all parts 
of the country and several new species of trees 
have been discovered.’”!® Sargent’s aim was to 
represent the arboreal flora of the continent, 
and he wanted Jesup’s vision to match his own. 
It Should Contain Every Tree 
As the sponsor of the collection, Jesup not 
only funded the collector’s activities but orga- 
nized logistics for travel and shipping. He was 
wealthy and generous, but disciplined and 
frugal in his philanthropy, interested to see 
that his money was well spent for the greatest 
benefit. To this end, he set as a goal keeping 
costs of travel and freight to a minimum, even 
zero, whenever possible. Nonetheless, the cost 
of transportation, shipping, and tracking the 
specimens across the country represented the 
majority of the project’s expenses and occupied 
much of the correspondence between Sargent 
and the museum during these early years. 
In the early weeks of 1881, Jesup personally 
communicated with the officers of dozens of 
railroad and steamship companies in order to 
procure travel passes for the collectors and free 
shipping for the weighty specimens they were 
expecting to send to New York from points 
around the country. Because the favors granted 
were often specific to individual collectors, over 
certain routes, and good only for specified peri- 
ods of time, this became for him a never-ending 
task that strained his ample reserves of tact and 
humility. Through Jesup’s general success in 
securing waivers, Sargent could then assign col- 
lectors to regions where they could travel freely 
and ship at no or reduced cost. 
In practice, there were frequent misunder- 
standings on the part of station agents who were 
unaware of these unconventional arrangements 
or would not act on them. Specimens were 
sometimes shipped from points or by routes 
other than what had been agreed upon, exceeded 
the weights and dimensions originally antici- 
pated, were delayed so long that they decayed 
in transit, or were occasionally even lost. The 
railroads, and Jesup, wanted definite parameters 
ahead of time, whereas Sargent better under- 
stood the idiosyncrasies and exigencies of field 
work and insisted that flexibility was necessary. 
It was Jesup’s money, and indeed his reputa- 
tion, at risk, and these overages and losses were 
routine points of contention between the two 
principals almost from the beginning.!’ 
As the true scale of the task became appar- 
ent, Jesup questioned Sargent’s early estimates 
about the cost of the project. He had initially 
thought that the collection could be completed 
for ten thousand dollars or possibly less,!® but 
that sum was exceeded before the end of the 
second year of work; total expenditures multi- 
plied fivefold before the sixth field season and 
continued to grow from there.!? Although Sar- 
gent promised to proceed as economically as he 
could, he maintained his emphasis on the need 
for a complete and scientifically valuable set 
of specimens. Following one expensive expedi- 
tion in 1885, for example, Sargent countered 
Jesup’s objections, telling him, “I hope you will 
not endeavor to separate practical value from 
