From Revd James Dalton   11 April 1830

Croft.

Saturday.

My Dear Sir

Yesterday’s Post brought me your Desiderata, & accompanying note: for it, & your kind intentions, accept my cordial thanks.

Contrary to what I had ventured to hope, I can be of some little use to you:– though many of your wants, are, also, my own. I am surprised to see some of your very near neighbours in the List– such as Artemisia Campestris (most abundant about Thetford) & Caucalis latifolia, which I, once, saw growing on the road from Newmarket to London – about a mile beyond the Devil’s Ditch. It left me with the Herbarium, for York. You appear to be carrying on a very brisk ver-fou, Dear Sir; a circumstance enviable enough. My correspondents are so few, that my zeal is, occasionally, much cooled:– but of all pursuits Dear Botany dispels the gloom of solitude the best. My spirit of communication is fervent; & I agree with you, fully, in thinking that, though it be delightful both to give & to receive, the former is preferable, of the two. I will do my best in your service, & am, really obliged to you for the agreeable engagement you have laid me under. Hooker’s Flora I am anxiously expecting: but can almost lament that some very material Genera will be done by another hand. That hand is, understandably, a very able one, Mr. Borrer: but I think more species will be allowed by him, this w. d have been the case had the hydra of Botany –Ribes– Rosa & Salix been subjected to the sword of the Glasgow Professor, who w. d have cut off some of the heads, instead of granting them a licence to live & multiply. I am far from meaning to disparage Borrer, whom I know & admire, not only as a most accurate Botanist, but as a liberal & kind Friend: all I w. d insinuate, is, that his eyes are so much more acute than my own, that I cannot always follow him in his investigations & decisions.

Have you seen Greville’s Algae Britannicae? I have the Book, but am not Algologist enough to decide upon its merits.

The nomenclature of Botany has now grown into a very arduous study – I could, almost, as readily learn that, as the 400,000 characters of the Chinese vocabulary. For the rising generation of Botanists, I have no doubt all this will be gain: but Decandolle, Brown & C o have thrown a wet blanket over us, old superannuated chaps, which few of us will be able to exist under. Have you Lycoperdon fornicatum (Geastrum of Greville)? If not, I can send you a good specimen.

Dear Sir,|very truly yours|Ja. s Dalton

[P.S.] Our mutual Friend Macfarlan talks of a trip to old alma mater. I wish he may be able to prevail upon you to try the air of Yorkshire, & the Side-boards of Yorkshire & the Cellars of D o. Mac is as friendly, kind hearted man as exists.–

Please cite as “HENSLOW-116,” in Ɛpsilon: The Correspondence of John Stevens Henslow accessed on 29 March 2024, https://epsilon.ac.uk/view/henslow/letters/letters_116