Letters of Asa Gray; Vol. 2

by Asa Gray

I think you might have specified De Morgan’s discovery of Bentham’s contribution to logic, and his able defense of the reclamation, to which Herbert Spencer’s “Verdict” in 1873 was not particularly needed for the establishment of the fact. De Morgan was not a man to leave his work half done, especially as against Hamilton.

I only regret that the length to which these most interesting matters extended stood in the way of your giving a more detailed account of Bentham’s botanical work, on which another article would be timely.

I must now, before long, attempt something of this, for the American Academy’s éloge. And I pray you, if you are not doing it yourself, to send me hints and suggestions. Sheet full, and I will not begin another to-day, but add only my wife’s love to you and Lady Hooker.

January 9, 1885.

The souvenir of dear Bentham has come to hand, is in its place on my table, and the first use I make of it, now in position, is to write to you this letter of thanks,—to you for awarding it to me, and to dear Lady Hooker for so promptly forwarding it. The stand is a beautiful piece of marble, bearing its two inkstands.[130] Was there ever anything to occupy the sunken area between them?...

Of myself I have not much to write. The prospect of getting off for the latter part of winter has just prevented my settling down to the “Flora,” and I have found plenty else to keep me actively employed, mainly with a revision of some boraginaceous genera, now in printer’s hands, which I hope, while it unsettles old work, will settle it better and permanently, as far as anything we do can be said to be lasting.

I am well,—can hardly be said to need the holiday we have determined on.... We shall benefit much, I think probable, by getting off to meet the spring, avoiding February-April here, which are the only drawbacks to a climate of the best: for you know I do not at all dislike summer heat.

We have not troubled ourselves much as to where we would go. But now it does seem that we will go to the southern part of California, if possible by the southern Arizona route, which is near the Mexican boundary, and must be best for winter, and to return by the route through the northern part of Arizona, which should be pleasant in the latter part of April. Oh, that you and Lady Hooker could be with us.... And we shall be lonely without you on our travels, and feel that “that great principle of the survival of the fittest” has been woefully violated....

City of Mexico, Sunday, February 22, 1885.

Your letter of January 20, forwarded from Cambridge, overtook us at San Antonio, Bexar. We left home February 3, in bitter cold, for St. Louis, where I had an interview with old Shaw, and heard him read his rearranged will, which is satisfactory, as it will allow his trustees, and the corporation of Washington University there, to turn his bequests to good account for botany; will be an endowment quite large enough for the purpose.