From:
Sir Joseph Dalton Hooker
To:
General William Munro
Date:
31 December 1869
Source of text:
MUN/1 f.130, The Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew
Summary:
No summary available.
Contributor:
Hooker Project
No summary available.
JDH & his wife have returned from Scythia via Stockholm, Wiborg [Vyborg], Helsingfors [Helsinki], the Swedish lakes, Copenhagen, Hamburg, Neuenhausen, Utrecht, Leyden, Amsterdam, Hage [Hague] & Rotterdam. He is tired of rail travel & hotels, he would prefer a tent in the jungle or a cabin at sea. JDH regrets that Gray has given up on the FL[ORA]. AM[ERICANA]. BOR[EALIS]. He describes Regel's poor organisation [of the International Botanical Congress] at St Petersburg, including the absence of any Russian botanists except [Alexander Andrejewitsch von] Bunge. A good 'show' was put on & many medals awarded, there was some misreporting of the medals given in the GARDENERS' CHRONICLE. JDH does not like St Petersburg, he prefers Moscow. They stayed with the Andersons in Stockholm, met old Fries, Theodor Fries & [Johnan Erhard] Areschoug in Upsala [Uppsala] & spent a day each with Reichenbach & Booth in Hamburgh [Hamburg]. He admires the antiquities museums of Stockholm & Denmark. They saw Wendland's Palms at Utrecht & stayed with Miguel. JDH returned to a lot of work at RBG Kew, including the matter of opening the gardens in the morning, he thinks it is the right thing to do but will mean reorganisation & a lot of additional work for him as so much of the running of Kew depends on him personally. He is made of strong stuff so can handle the work but he expects [John] Smith, Curator of the Gardens, will be overwhelmed. JDH mentions the state of his personal finances & describes himself as 'living hand to mouth'. Concludes with news that Darwin is in North Wales & very unwell, Bentham & Baker are on holiday, the latter in Geneva, & [Thomas] Thomson is well.
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Reflects how Bentham might have been more cautious had he read ARW's volumes.
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Pleased to come on 17th.
Is arranging the Aucuba experiment.
Sends some letters for CD’s perusal.
Asks what CD thinks of Huxley’s address [Q. J. Geol. Soc. Lond. 25 (1869): xxviii–liii].
Would be glad to have Drosophyllum plants.