all possibility of classification will vanish. Is this grand phenomenon of analogies susceptible of explanation? Yes, if we adopt the system of common origin and of the evolution of forms; No, if we hold that of primordiality, and the independence of forms. There are seven or eight hundred kinds of Solanum disseminated over an immense extent of country in the Old and New World; all are specifically distinct, but all resemble each other in a certain sum of common characters, incomparably more important, in the eyes of the Classifier, than the completely external, and, so to speak, superficial differences by which they are distinguished, since these common characters assign to all their places in the same class, the same family, the same genus. I ask then, are these analogies a fact without any cause in physical order? Do they exist fortuitously or simply because it has pleased God that they should exist? If you hold to the system of the independent origin of the species, you will have to choose between chance, which is an absurdity, and a supernatural fact, that is to say, a miracle, two elements which do not pass current in science. Allow, on the contrary, a common ancestor to all these species; generalise in the vegetable kingdom this faculty, of which the present forms preserve the last relics, of gradual subdivision, according to the necessities of nature, into secondary forms which diverge from the common point of origin, in order to be presently themselves sub-divided into new forms, and you will arrive gradually, without any abruptness, and by the sole act of evolution, at species, races, and at the slightest varieties. The superficial traits will vary from one form to the other, but the common essential foundation will always subsist; you may have a thousand derivative forms, but each of them will have the impress of its origin, the sign of its relation to all the others, and it is this sign which will guide you in uniting them into the same family and the same genus.

These ideas of the general relationship between beings of the same genus, the same family, the same kingdom, are not new to me; it is ten years since I expressed them in the Revue Horticole, and I confess I have felt not a little flattered at seeing them professed by English savants of the highest distinction. This is the way in which I expressed myself in 1852. "We do not believe that nature has proceeded, in the formation of species, in any other manner than we ourselves proceed to form varieties, &c. (See Revue Horticole, 1852, p. 104, &c.*

"The vegetable kingdom regarded in this point of view would no longer present itself as a linear series of which the terms would proceed increasing or decreasing in complexity of organization, according as we examine them by commencing at one extremity or the other; it would no longer be a disorderly entanglement of intercrossing lines; not even a geographic map whose regions, differing in form and extent would touch each other at a larger or smaller number of points; but a tree whose roots, concealed in the depths of cosmogonical æras, had given birth to a limited number of successively divided and sub-divided stems. These first stems would represent the primordial types of the kingdom; their last ramifications would be the present species.

"The result would be that a perfect and rigorous classification of organised beings of the same kingdom, of the same family, would be nothing else than a genealogical tree of species, indicating the relative antiquity of each, its degree of speciality and the line of ancestors from which it had descended. The different degrees of relationship of species would thus be represented as it were in a palpable and material fashion, as also that of the groups of different degrees, going back to the primordial types themselves. Such a classification, drawn up in a graphic table, would be comprehended with as much ease by the mind as by the eyes, and would present the most beautiful application of that principle which is generally admitted by naturalists, that nature is sparing of causes but prodigal of effects."

Since these notions were put forth, I have been able to modify them in certain details, but their foundation has remained in my mind. I believe then in the unity of origin, and in the derivation of living beings from the same branch; and by consequence in a single focus of creation whence the stocks of these great branches have been elaborated, from a common nucleus. This first unity of bond does not exclude the secondary centres of the multiplication of forms in which I equally believe, and of which traces remain, notwithstanding so many dislocations of the surface of the globe. What I regard as no less certain, is that the forms, during the process of multiplication in the course of ages, have always followed divergent paths, and that, in consequence, it is contrary to nature to suppose that species can be changed the one into the other, or that two species can be melted into one by hybridisation.

LI. NOTICES OF DISTINGUISHED NATURALISTS RECENTLY

DECEASED.

DURING the last few weeks, we have to deplore the loss of three men distinguished in various branches of science, whose deaths will leave vacancies, that it will be by no means easy to supply. We extract the following notices of their active and laborious lives from the pages of some of our contemporaries.

Sir William Jackson Hooker, K.H., D.C.L, F.R.S. &c., Director of the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, died at his residence, in Kew, on the 12th of August last, having just completed his 80th year.

Sir William Hooker was born in 1785. His father, who was in business at Norwich, was a man who devoted all his leisure to reading, especially travels and German literature, and to the cultivation of curious plants; by which doubtless, was laid the foundation of that love of natural history for which his son became distinguished. Sir William's education was received at the High School of Norwich. Having at an early age inherited an ample competency from his godfather, William Jackson, Esq., he formed the design of devoting his life to travelling and natural history. Ornithology and entomology first attracted his attention; but, being happily the discoverer of a rare moss, which he took to Sir J. E. Smith, he received from that eminent botanist the bias which determined his future career. Henceforth, botany was his sole aim; and with the view of collecting plants, he made expeditions to Scotland and its islands, France, Switzerland, and Iceland. and also extensive preparations for a prolonged exploration of Ceylon, which plan was, however, frustrated by the disturbances which broke out in that island.

During this period, 1806-14, he formed the acquaintance of all the principal scientific men in England and on the Continent, and commenced that intercourse and correspondence which never ceased till the day of his death. In 1815 he married the daughter of Dawson Turner, of Yarmouth, himself well known as a good botanist, and settled at Halesworth, in Suffolk. Here was laid the foundation of his now magnificent herbarium, and here commenced a long series of valuable botanical works, which followed each other at short intervals up to the present time. An increasing family and a decreasing income induced him, in 1820, to accept the Regius Professorship of Botany in Glasgow, at which place the next twenty years of his life

were passed, and where his popularity as a lecturer, his admirable method of training his students, and his genial and attractive manners, soon made his house a rendezvous for all scientific men who visited Scotland-we might almost say England. Gradually his correspondence and his herbarium alike increased; the latter receiving large contributions from his numerous pupils, who, in foreign countries, remembered with gratitude the teacher who had placed science before them in so attractive a form.

In 1836 he received the honour of knighthood from William the Fourth, in acknowledgment of his distinguished botanical career, and of the services he had rendered to science; and in 1841 his connexion with Scotland terminated, and a new era of his life began with his appointment to Kew. To be Director of Kew Gardens had long been the ambition of Sir William Hooker's mind; and throughout his long residence in Glasgow he never abandoned the possibility of eventually being placed in that position. He was encouraged in these views by a nobleman well known for his distinguished patronage of literature and science, and himself a keen horticulturist, and no mean botanist. We allude to the late John, Duke of Bedford, who through the influence of his son, Lord John Russell, a statesman then rapidly rising into power, exerted a silent but most powerful influence with the Government and officers of the Queen's Household, in effecting the transference of the Gardens to the public. Sir William's appointment was indeed drawn up by Earl Russell; it gave him a salary of £300 a-year, with £200 to hire a dwelling-house for himself, which should be large enough to contain his library and herbarium, the latter requiring no fewer than twelve ordinary sized rooms for their accommodation. This was afterwards increased to £800 a-year, with an official house in the Gardens, and accommodation for his herbarium in the residence of the late King of Hanover, where it forms the principal part of the great Herbarium of Kew. The noble Earl is fond of stating that on taking Sir William's appointment for signature to a brother Lord of the Treasury, the latter remarked, "Well, we have done a job at last!"

The history of Sir William's career as Director of the Royal Gardens is so well and so widely known that it need not detain us long. From a garden of eleven acres, without herbarium, library, or museum, and characterized by the stinginess of its administration, under his sole management it has risen to an establishment comprising 270

acres, laid out with wonderful skill and judgment—including an arboretum of all such trees and shrubs as will stand the open air in this country, magnificent ranges of hot-houses and conservatories, such as no three establishments on the Continent put together can rival-three museums, each an original conception of itself, containing many thousand square feet of glass, and filled with objects of interest in the vegetable kingdom from all parts of the globe, a herbarium unrivalled for extent, arrangement, accuracy of nomenclature, and beauty of keep, and excellent botanical libraries, including small ones for the use of the gardeners and museums.

To the accumulation of these treasures he not only brought all the powers of his Glasgow correspondence, but by means of his friendly relations with the Admiralty, Colonial and Foreign Offices, Indian Office, and many private companies, enlarged the bounds of his intercourse in all directions, and at a comparative trifling cost procured specimens from countries the most distant and difficult of access.

To him is due the formation of many of our Colonial Gardens, and the resuscitation of the rest; his example has stimulated national gardens on the Continent, to a degree they never felt before; whilst the amount of information on all branches of economic botany which he has diffused among the labouring and manufacturing classes can hardly be over-estimated.

In conclusion, it is only right to state that though these more public duties have naturally attracted the most attention, his scientific labours not only did not cease on his coming to Kew, but were literally doubled. Rising early and going to bed late, and rarely going into society, the whole of his mornings and evenings were devoted to scientific botany. The "Species Filicum," prepared wholly at Kew, is of itself a sufficient monument of one man's industry; and when to this we add that he published from his own pen upwards of fifty volumes of descriptive botany, all of them of merit and standard authority, it must be confessed that his public career has in no way interfered with his scientific one. Indeed, up to the day of his death his publications were progressing as busily as ever, and the first part had appeared of a new work, the "Synopsis Filicum," for the continuation of which extensive preparations had been made.

Not content with publishing himself, he was always forward in obtaining for others remunerative botanical employment. Besides numberless appointments given to young and rising gardeners and botanists, he procured the publication of the results of many scien