Chapter V (3)

When I got your proof-sheet of the “British Flora” and your long letter of 28th May, there was something I wanted to talk about, I dare say, but there was no writing then, as you had gone abroad, and now the subject is all out of my head. But I have occasion to take up the subject of popular names of plants quite seriously in a week or two, and I may have something to remark.

I wish to follow your lead, but should be disposed to go rather farther than you do in adopting English names. For instance, I would certainly adopt Mousetail instead of Myosure. Myosure is hardly more English than before clipping its tail a little, and Mousetail is the exact equivalent. Corydal and Astragal I quite like, as they have really no English names. I incline to Crowfoot as a generic appellation. To extend it over the whole genus is only doing what is so often done with scientific generic names. In the case of genera having very strongly marked subgenera, would it not be possible to let the subgeneric name govern the popular nomenclature? as say--

Pear; genus=Pyrus, under it
Pear, with its species;
Apple, 1. Common Apple,
2. Crab-Apple, etc.

There are formidable difficulties about this popular nomenclature, yet they must be surmounted in some way or other.

As we are making much of English, why not say “rootstock” instead of “rhizome.” I do not like French forms. I would even say “pod” instead of “capsule,” in popular parlance.

Kindly send me proofs as you go on. I want much to see them.

Wright’s collections in North Pacific Expedition are here, and he is turning over his Behring Straits collection and trying to work it out, with some help from me. There is a Hongkong collection; there may be some of these he would like to ask you to name, so far as you may off hand. The Japan collection I will elaborate myself. There is not so much from the north as I expected. They had no chance to explore the small islands connecting with the Kurile Islands. I have only peeped into one or two parcels; but in one I saw two things which will interest you as much as they did me. Imagine the two most characteristic possible eastern United States plants, Caulophyllum and Diphylleia, both, I believe, our very species. Tell this to Dr. Hooker!

The only domestic news I have to tell you is, that on a hot August day our beloved Newfoundland dog was found dead,--really a sad loss. To console us my brother-in-law, a fortnight after, sent me a puppy of the same breed, an uneasy, frolicsome, awkward fellow yet, but promising to be intelligent and very handsome. We could not bear to give him the name of his lamented predecessor; so Mrs. Gray named him Hans,--a souvenir of Pontrilas....

* * * * *

Dr. Gray’s dogs and cats were always well-recognized members of the family. He had a great love of animals, which was warmly returned by his different pets. In his early married life the kittens he helped raise by feeding them with a dropping-tube from his microscope rather preferred him to their young and careless mother, and, confounding all other men with him, were perpetually scrambling into laps, to the surprise of callers. Two grew into fine cats, who demanded a regular attention and consideration from him, reminding him by gentle taps, one on each side, when bedtime came.

Of his first dog, he always said that they stood more in the relation of brothers than master and dog; and the dog felt a guardian care of him. The different characters of his two Newfoundland dogs, and of the smaller ones he had later, interested him, for they were singularly different, though both the Newfoundlands shared his affection for a pretty Maltese cat who had succeeded the other cats; they were especially fond of her kittens and attentive to them, allowing them all sorts of liberties. The cats and dogs always lived affectionately together. Dr. Gray always recognized their good consciences, which varied somewhat with the different type of animal, and considered that the size of different breeds had much to do with their characteristics. They always learned to eat what their master did; not so much, he would say, from any preference for oysters and dry toast, as that they were ambitious to do as far as possible what he did.

He was very skillful in the handling of animals, and they recognized it in allowing him to perform small surgical operations, to dress wounds, etc., with a touching trust and submission.

TO GEORGE BENTHAM.

March 9, 1858.

MY DEAR BENTHAM,--Many thanks for yours of February 14. Although much pleased to hear from you, I cannot expect to hear often, unless you have something special to say. No one but Hooker can write long and frequent letters while he is doing such a vast amount of work, and keeping up such a fresh, and keen, and scrutinizing interest in such a great variety of subjects. I wonder how he does it. How well oiled the machinery of his brain must be to do it all without great wear and tear! If you or I had half these matters to think of at once, we should go distracted. Warn Hooker to take good care of himself and not break down in health. It is a facility which he inherits, that of turning from one thing to another without loss of time or of working power.

I shall be pleased to see the “Handbook” when it is out. Never mind what people say. I dare say the little book will do a great deal of good....

I am glad you will distribute more of Spruce’s plants. I want especially any of his Andes collections, for Baños was one of our Exploring Expedition stations. I am going to finish up our Exploring Expedition this year (D. V.), and have done with it. That and some other things done, and I dream of coming over to England, and working at nothing but “North American Flora,” de novo. I hope I may, and that I shall find you and Mrs. B. as fresh as ever, and enjoying yourselves to the full....

April 26.

My last book[37] in elementary botany is now just off my hands, and will be out in a fortnight. I hope it will be of use. Forgive me for writing horn-books, and I am now done with that sort of work. There were several convincing reasons for doing it.

TO DANIEL CADY EATON.[38]

February 23, 1858.

I dare say you may learn something here as to teaching, etc., if you can pick it up yourself, which, after all, is the only way anything worth knowing is obtained. But from now to the end of April I am just overwhelmed with work, and shall have no time to give any special instruction.

At the opening of the term I begin my drilling of Sophomores in the “Botanical Text-Book.” My lectures to a selection of Juniors, on Systematic Botany, I do not ordinarily commence till April 1, but this year I am able to begin early in March, though not much work is done till May. You might attend Agassiz’s lectures, but he will not be back from Florida as soon as the opening of the term.

Let me know how much instruction you have to give this year, and of what sort, and I can see whether I can help you much. I dare say you will teach very well.

There are certain little matters you might pick up about class illustration and manipulation without it costing you much time. We were just thinking of sending you Wright’s Hongkong ferns.

Suppose you come on, count as a pupil, or as a visitor, as you like, work away as you think best, making preparations for your course, in which I will help you all I can. And at the same time work up Wright’s Hongkong and Bonin and Japan ferns (bring any books you want which I have not). I want to drill you a little at systematic work, and think you will learn something that way. Come straight here. We shall want you to stay with us, if the house is empty. And if not we shall make no difficulty of sending you down to the Brattle House. But it would be so much more convenient here.

I am very desirous that you should be duly established at Yale, and have no doubt you will satisfy the college and fill the place with comfort and credit.

We will talk over matters at odd moments when you come.

I shall be most glad to help you as a friend and fellow-worker; but I cannot promise any special instruction, and shall take no fee. “Dog does not eat dog,” is the saying, you know.

* * * * *

Judge Lowell writes, in 1888, “I was in college when Dr. Gray was appointed to his professorship at Harvard, and ours was, I think, the first or one of the first classes to whom he lectured. I remember his lectures well, they were so full of knowledge and of enthusiasm and so calculated to impress the young mind.

“I suppose he had not lectured much of late years; and in his many other successes, his powers as a lecturer may have been overlooked by those who have written of him.”

Dr. Rothrock, in his address before the memorial meeting of the botanical section of the Academy at Philadelphia, speaks of Dr. Gray’s patient drilling of him in writing his thesis, making him go over and over it again, until it had been rewritten six times before he allowed him to be satisfied with it. His pupils would always remember his comment when satisfied,--“That is neatly stated.”

And Dr. Farlow shows the picturesque figure “hurrying down Garden Street (on lecture mornings) so covered by the mass of branches and flowers which were to illustrate the lecture that his head and body were hardly visible.”[39]

“The few who gathered around the little table in Harvard Hall, in pursuit of knowledge which did not count in the college reckoning, will never forget the untiring patience with which he explained what then seemed difficult, the contagious enthusiasm with which he led them on from simple facts toward the higher fields of science, or the tender personal interest which he showed in their hopes and half-formed plans for the future; an interest which, on his part, only strengthened as years passed on, and makes them now mourn, not so much the death of a great botanist as the loss of a sympathizing friend.”[40]

TO W. J. HOOKER.

April 30, 1858.

I must tell you that in humble imitation of Kew, I am going to establish a museum of vegetable products, etc., in our university.

The erection of a new building for the Museum of Comparative Anatomy and for the Mineralogical Cabinet liberates the very fine hall used for the Mineralogical Cabinet formerly. This I have applied for, and obtained for my purposes, and am taking into it the various things I have picked up from time to time. It is a room about forty-five feet long, with deep alcoves the whole length of each side, already shelved, and with glass doors to the cases, a window in each of the ten alcoves; the centre, or nave, serves for my lecture-room. So now I shall beg all my students and correspondents to send me every sort of vegetable thing; so if there is anything you need still from this country you should let me know; and whenever you are overrun with duplicate woods, etc., just think how welcome such things would be here, and how they may stimulate our collectors and travelers, who perchance may occasionally send me something that would fill some gap in the Kew museum.

Mr. Wright is having a good training here, and when he goes again to Cuba, or elsewhere, will do much better, both as to common botanical specimens and for collecting vegetable products and curiosities.

Dr. A. A. Gould, who will bring a line to you, is a physician in Boston, and one of our best zoölogists, especially in conchology, etc.; a most excellent man. He takes a well-deserved holiday for three months or so, mostly in a run over the Continent. He has London friends in plenty. He may like to see Kew Gardens before one o’clock, and would be pleased to pay his respects to you in person, if his time allows a flying visit to Kew before he proceeds to the Continent.

Just at this moment, and since my parcel of books for you left the house, the May number of “Silliman’s Journal” has come in. I will ask Dr. Gould to take it to you....

June 21.

About the museum. Ours is to be not economical (except in the sense that it must not cost anything to speak of) but for class illustration and botanical research. So I want woods, fruits, seeds, etc., and must keep all within narrow limits. All I could venture to ask from you is that whenever your keeper or Dr. Hooker should be throwing out duplicates to save room, you would have some such things boxed up for me. I should indeed like to go over to you, and select for myself, as you and Dr. Hooker suggest. Joseph suggests that I should be sent over by the university for the purpose! His whole idea is as magnificent as my plan is humble. I fear I must always travel and cross the ocean at my own charges. But the proposition suggests to me that, when I am ready to revisit England, this will be a good ground for asking leave of absence without cutting off my pay. But there is much to be done before I can leave home again, and when I shall be ready and able to do so, if it please Providence that I may be, I want two full years and most of it at Kew. How I hope it may be done in your day, and that I may receive your cordial greeting, and find you as hale and as actively useful as ever. But “l’homme propose,” etc. We are delighted to hear from Mrs. E. that you are well and strong again.

Boott kindly writes me of Brown by every mail; by the next arrival we must expect to hear that he is no more....

Wherever Wright goes, you may rely upon the fullest set of his gatherings, and we may expect they will be better than formerly. For (what I never thought he would have patience for) he has really taken to studying botany, which he never did before, and digs away at his dried specimens most perseveringly. At first it went against the grain, and he used to wish himself far off in the woods. But he has kept on for six or eight months, and now generally prefers to find out a plant by his own skill, rather than have me tell him what it is; so he will be able to collect more understandingly, and the year passed here will not be lost time.

* * * * *

Dr. Robert Brown died shortly after the date of this letter. In Dr. Gray’s memoir of him, he says:--

“Upon the death of Robert Brown, it was remarked that, next to Humboldt, his name adorned the list of a greater number of scientific societies than that of any other naturalist or philosopher. It was Humboldt himself who, many years ago, saluted Brown with the appellation, ‘Botanicorum facile princeps,’ and the universal consent of botanists recognized and confirmed the title.... Brown delighted to rise from a special case to high and wide generalizations; and was apt to draw most important and always irresistible conclusions from small selected data or particular points of structure. He had unequaled skill in finding decisive instances.... So all his discoveries and all his notes and observations are fertile far beyond the reader’s expectation. Perhaps no naturalist ever taught so much in writing so little.... Those who knew him as a man will bear unanimous testimony to the unvarying simplicity, truthfulness, and benevolence of his character, as well as to the singular uprightness of his judgment.”[41]

TO R. W. CHURCH.

June 1, 1858.

Your gift of the “Oxford Essays” came to me, and was partly read with much interest before the arrival of your kind letter of the 31st March. Many thanks for both.

I know too little of French literature, early or late, but I admire your article for its neat and delicate delineation and discrimination of character. I read with interest, not unmingled with concern, Baden Powell’s and Wilson’s articles. The latter person I heard preach one of the Bampton lectures at Oxford, 1851. Into what will the latitudinarian school, if I may so call it, develop at Oxford?

Gladstone’s article I have not had time to read yet, nor his large work, which probably will reach us presently, through our book club,--I hope at a time when I have more leisure than now.

Last week the publishers, at my request, sent to Trübner & Company, American booksellers (12 or 20) Paternoster Row, a copy of a new and more elementary book[42] of mine than the one you are pleased to compliment. I intended that as a kind of horn-book, which Dr. Hooker insists it is not; and as something more simple was wanted here, to lead the way both to the “Lessons” and especially to the “Manual,” which is rather strong for beginners, I have tried again, and you will see the result. I should have made the little “Popular Flora” fuller if the publishers had allowed more room.

Having last year reëdited my “Botanical Textbook” (of which, to complete your set, a copy is also sent to you, through Trübner), I have now done my part in elementary botanical writing, and I return with zest to my drier investigations, in which I have much to do.

If I ever find time I am greatly disposed to write some day upon the principles of classification,--the ground in nature for classification, the nature and distribution and probable origin of species,--knotty points, upon which I incline to differ decidedly from Agassiz, and considerably from the common notions.

Some of the more immediate and best-established deductions I hope to bring out in a paper I shall soon be occupied with, containing the results of a comparison of the flora of Japan (in which I have new materials) with our own of the United States of America.

My college work keeps me very busy at this season.

... I see no near prospect of revisiting the Old World. The commercial troubles last autumn have reduced our moderate means and prospects a little. But if I live I must yet have two years’ work in England and on the Continent. With great regard, I remain,

Yours very faithfully, ASA GRAY.

TO JOHN TORREY.

July 27, 1858.

I have to-day received a nice present from Vilmorin of Paris, i. e., the copy of Robert Brown’s “Prodromus,” presented by him to A. L. de Jussieu.

... I am kept here, too, by the attending suddenly to building a new conservatory, for which a donation of $2,000 has been received. I cannot leave till it is well under way.

I am deep in Japan botany; interesting results.

September 24.

At length we are home again, arriving night before last, very direct from Quebec, where we had (as everywhere else upon our whole route--Litchfield, New York, Palisades, Fairfield, Sauquoit, Montreal, etc.) a delightful time. J. much stronger, except for a cold caught in Quebec, which still lingers.

Colonel Munro[43] was very kind; is a jolly good fellow, as the English say.

TO GEORGE ENGELMANN.

October 14, 1858.

By this time you are in your house, I hope, and all comfortable, and ready soon to set to work.

I rejoice to hear that Mr. Shaw keeps up his zeal, and will make a creditable establishment. I wish him all prosperity. If he will make and keep up a general herbarium it will save you much time and money....

October 30.

I have yours of the 24th. Tatnall[44] is an old friend of Dr. Darlington, new to me, but writing to me of late. I know not his age, profession, character, etc., etc. But he appears to know the plants around him very well....

Hope you are getting settled down and comfortable.

I met Agassiz at the Club. He is cordial and pleasant. He had not heard of your return, which I wondered at....

Fendler is with you, at least in St. Louis. Short is ready to advance something if he will fall to collecting again wherever you say. Get him some appointment with the army at Utah. That is the place. What is the good of your both being Democrats if you cannot get something for it!!

December 3.

Darwin asks me to find out if you medical men have ascertained or noticed any difference in liability to take fevers of warm climates, say yellow fever, between light-complexioned and dark-complexioned people of the Caucasian race. If you know personally anything about it, or where anything is published bearing on the point, kindly let me know, and oblige

Your old friend, ASA GRAY.

TO GEORGE BENTHAM.

December 13, 1858.

Boott writes in glowing terms of your paper on British flora and distribution lately read; and I hope soon to read it in the “Linnæan Journal.”

That the interchange of temperate species between North America and Europe has taken place via Asia is now a patent fact; and now the whole subject, and the probable explanation, begins to be clear to see.

December 31.

A happy New Year to you and Mrs. Bentham, and many thanks for your letter promising me your paper on Hongkong plants to print here. Pray give me passim any notes that occur to you upon Loo Choo plants, etc. I shall now soon be done with my Japan studies, and shall print a paper bringing to view curious facts of distribution, etc., and lay out a set for the Kew herbarium. How true it is, as you intimated, that the interchange in northern hemisphere has mainly been via Asia.

I heartily admire your “Handbook,” and await with great interest your paper growing out of it; your experience is so great and your judgment so sound. As to English nomenclature, we can only approximate to a good system; the practical difficulties are too great, often insurmountable. It seems to me you hit the happy medium, if we must needs have popular name of the genus coëxtensive with the Latin one; but I rather doubt the advisability of that, and would use sub-generic popular names for generic, I think. Though “I do not much like” the whole thing, yet somebody must attend to English nomenclature, for better or worse; so I am glad you took it up.

I hope you will study perigynous and epigynous. As to ovary, which, putting the important part for the whole, we have learned to use in place of pistil, it certainly is perfectly novel to me to hear the name applied to the gynæcium of Ranunculus. I am confident the word is never so used in De Candolle or Endlicher. I do not recall any instance of your using the word in any such sense; I am sure I never did. Where the fact of the combination is doubtful or ambiguous, if I said ovary, that would infer the combination; if ovaries, the distinctness. In Apocynaceæ A. De Candolle steadily writes ovarium or ovaria, according to the nature of the case. Per contra, you might as well call the column of Malva a stamen! For the collective term, I wish, in your paper, you would go for restoring to use the Linnæan term pistillum, and against the habit of using ovarium in a double sense, that is, sometimes for whole female organ, sometimes for its ovule-bearing portion. Pray do not add a third; and so when you speak of ovary in Clematis leave us to gather, from the context, whether you mean, (1) the whole gynæcium; (2) a separate pistil; or, (3) the ovuliferous portion of a pistil.

Hooker calls my judgment about root and radicle “a flippant snub”! I beg a thousand pardons, and had no intention to be flippant or dogmatical, but simply to record a fact. For _mistake_, pray read _take_. My thanks for his letter of December 8th; will write him soon.

February 2, 1859.

I wish I had now your paper on geographical distribution, while I am working up the relations of the Japan flora in this respect. Where is Agardh’s paper published, and what does it amount to?...

I cannot answer Dr. Hooker’s exceedingly interesting letter about theoretical ancient distribution of plants this week. Tell him I shall have some evidence which will come well into his views as to north temperate zone.

TO W. J. HOOKER.

January 24, 1859.

I hope soon to hear that Government will acquire your herbarium, and make bountiful provision for its increase and maintenance. After all Brown’s genius, you have done more for botany than a dozen Browns, and made a hundredfold more sacrifices and efforts. To you, and to your son, England and the botanical world owe the greatest debt of gratitude,--a debt which I hope will continue to accumulate a long time yet....

TO JOHN TORREY.

January 7, 1859.

MY DEAR FRIEND,--I will send your bundles presently, after Tuesday next, till when I must work like a dog, to get through the Japan collection, and read a paper on Tuesday at a social meeting of the Academy at Mr. Loring’s house that evening (January 11th). Now come on (if by day train), stop there, 8 Ashburton Place, where I will be.

I am going to hold forth for nearly an hour, upon Japan botany in its relation to ours and the rest of the northern temperate zone, and knock out the underpinning of Agassiz’s theories about species and their origin; show, from the very facts that stumbled De Candolle, the high probability of single and local creation of species, turning some of Agassiz’s own guns against him.

I introduced it here at Club, last month, and Agassiz took it very well, indeed....

I asked Thurber the name of a couple of Grasses. Let the Grass-man speak; now that he is turned out to grass, let him attend to his grazing.

February 19.

Andersson writes me that I am chosen one of the six botanists on the foreign list of Stockholm Academy, to fill the vacancy caused by Robert Brown’s death.

Friday evening, [April].

I have your two favors of 12th and 15th. I am very grateful for the nice care you take of my wife. You seem to have her under very thorough control.

Cure her up fast as you can, and please return her per railway on the 3d of May; for the 4th being the eleventh anniversary of our union, we must not be separated then--“The Union, it must be preserved.” ...

I send back your Cavendish with many thanks.

The old cock was much like Robert Brown in many respects. Though there is nothing in him to love, he calls out a sort of admiration, partly in the literal sense, that is, wonder, mixed with pity, that he had no feelings. Brown had, and besides he was social and not so very queer, but he lived very much in the same way, and I suppose had as little sense of religion.

Schreber spells Anthephora, but gives no derivation. P. de B., you see, does, so Anthephora is doubtless right.

Can that and Buffalo-grass be the same? I doubt. Has the Anthephora-like plant no stamens of its own?

The mode of growth does not so much distinguish your plant from Newberry’s Hemitones, and verily I suspect they are the same species. Pity you come in and spoil a good name!...

TO A. DE CANDOLLE.

April 27, 1859.

I am charmed at the intelligence you give of your son, and that he takes to botany with spirit, so that he may continue the celebrity of the honored name of De Candolle in the third generation.

We shall welcome him when he comes to America and will do all we can to advance his objects. Oregon and the country to the north of it (British Columbia) will be in good and safe condition to explore, and I am convinced that there is still much to find in the Sandwich Islands, especially in the interior of Hawaii, where there is said to be a broad, almost untrodden, wooded region, between the principal mountain-masses, and occupying a good part of the interior of the island. But it will take time, patience, and considerable means to explore this region; provisions must be carried in for a long way, and many natives employed in feeding the exploring party. Next, the Kurile Islands, and all the northern part of Japan, Yesso, and the islands northeast of it offer the greatest interest; Manchuria also, but the Russians will look after that; Korea could perhaps be explored, so that the expedition you have suggested strikes my fancy as the best that could be, and would take your son through regions full of interest, safe to explore, and healthy. Certainly I can suggest nothing better.

Pray give my best regards to M. Boissier and to other friends in Geneva. I trust you will have safety and tranquillity in Switzerland. But it appears as if you would have war all around you,--a very sad state of things. Our latest intelligence looks very warlike, I am sorry to see. With all my heart I join in the supplication, “Give peace in our time, O Lord.” From such a war as is threatened no good can spring, in any result....

Ever and very cordially yours,

ASA GRAY.

TO GEORGE ENGELMANN.

May 18, 1859.

Well, even $10,000 a year is much better than nothing for the botanical establishment. I wish we had half of that....

If Shaw will be liberal in his establishment, why not turn over to him your general herbarium? If I had one I could have free access to always, I would not take the expense and trouble of keeping up and increasing one myself....

So, you have made the capital discovery, and proved the so-called Anthephora to be the female of Buffalo-grass. I would not have believed it without direct evidence.

I cannot study it; it would take me a long while to get the case so before me that my opinion about the affinities of the grass would be of any use; but it is most interesting, and I beg you to work it out in detail and thoroughly....

June 6.

As to your own herbarium, I think you are right for the present. Keep you own; arrange it on paper of the size of Shaw’s. But look to an eventual combination, either in Shaw’s lifetime or soon after, and be open to propositions from Shaw; as, for example, to take your whole herbarium, provide for maintenance and increase, and when ready, to make you director of the whole concern. This duty must devolve upon you, and when it does, with a decent salary, you could reside up there, throw physic to the dogs, or only take a share in consultations, and have time to do yourself justice in botany.

Meanwhile, if Shaw would take your herbarium upon proper terms, you might at any time have any particular families of plants with you, in your house, to work at....

Mr. Shaw has lately written. I inclose his letter to you. I have just replied to it, expressing a lively interest in his projected establishment, and offering my best services if he requires them in the way of advice or suggestion. I hope it will be all right in the end....