Middlesex.
On the evening of Whitsun Tuesday, a sermon is annually preached in the ancient church of St. James, Mitre Court, Aldgate, London, from a text having special reference to flowers. This is popularly called the “Flower sermon.”—Kalendar of the English Church, 1865, p. 74.
On this day is delivered in St. Leonard’s Church, Shoreditch, a “Botanical sermon”—the Fairchild Lecture,—for which purpose funds were left by Thomas Fairchild, who died in 1729. It was formerly the custom of the President and several Fellows of the Royal Society to hear this sermon preached.—Timbs’ Something for Everybody, 1861, p. 80.