Makers of British Botany; a collection of biographies by living botanists

by Unknown

Alston's teaching was mainly directed to the Materia Medica. His full course of lectures on the subject prepared for publication by himself appeared only as a posthumous work edited by his successor Dr Hope, and they reflect the best knowledge of the time, showing rational scepticism of the efficacy of many simples which experiment had not tested. Essays "On Opium," and "On tin as anthelmintic," and an "Index of Simples" published by him tell of his pharmacological investigations, to which his correspondence with Fothergill and others is also witness. The subject in this line to which he gave most attention and on which he wrote three dissertations based on experiments is that of Quicklime and Water—its efficacy in Calculus and also as an agent for keeping water sweet. From Alston, Stephen Hales, then in touch with the Admiralty upon questions of ventilation and other matters of sanitation, obtained early suggestions, and a long correspondence followed.

Alston, who had to earn his livelihood by medical practice, gave much time to the administration of the Botanic Gardens under his charge, and the elaborate lists which he prepared showing the disposition of plants in the Gardens, witness to his interest in their cultivation. His predilection in systematic arrangement was Tournefortian, and on the promulgation by Linnaeus of his "sexual system" in 1736, no writer was more trenchant than Alston in opposition to it, and by this he became widely known. His criticism was directed against it, not as a method of arranging plants by readily recognised characters, but from the standpoint of denial of the existence of sex. By various experiments as well as by argument, Alston endeavoured to disprove the necessity of the stamens for the development of fertile seed, citing cases of seed-production where no application of the "dust" from the stamens was possible—thus early recognising conditions which puzzled botanists for many generations afterwards and until the explanation of apogamy was supplied. One is tempted to wonder whether if the Linnaean system had not received the appellation "sexual" it would have roused the same condemnation from him as it did.

From his published work, notably the Dissertation on Botany (1754) a translation of a portion of his earlier Tirocinium Botanicum Edinburgense (1740), as also from some MS. of his lectures which still exist, we recognise the clearness and vigour of mind of Alston, and the precision of the man is made abundantly evident in the beautiful copper-plate writing in old script of his MS. Page after page is filled without blot or correction, and the whole systematised and arranged without flaw. Anatomical questions were dealt with by him in consonance with the knowledge of the time, mainly resting on Malpighi; but there is no rational treatment of physiological subjects, and this is the more surprising inasmuch as he was in intimate correspondence with Hales, and ought to have been acquainted with the fundamental experimental work of that physiologist. It may be that the fragments of record from which we have to judge are insufficient for correct appraisement, but on all the evidence we possess we must conclude that the two volumes of his Materia Medica give us a picture of the direction of his teaching, and that Botany in the hands of its leading expositor in Edinburgh was at this period only a hand-maid to Medicine.

The advent of Alston's successor, John Hope, was the dawn of new things. The influence of the work of Hales had reached Edinburgh. Comparatively few botanists of to-day have heard the name of John Hope otherwise than as that of a correspondent of Linnaeus and protagonist in this country of his system of classification, for these are the claims to distinction assigned to him by the historians of British Botany; and if one reckons the value of a man's life-work in science by his published writings alone, that of John Hope would be a minimum; for only such papers as those "On Rheum palmatum," "On Ferula Assafoetida," "On Eriocaulon septangulare in Scotland," are extant from his pen. Yet John Hope was a botanist inspired by the spirit of research who obtained by scientific experimental work and explained to his pupils facts of plant physiology some of which the botanical world learned from other workers only a hundred years afterwards. It is difficult to account for Hope's reticence. It may be that he intended to give his work to the world in the book upon Botany which had engaged his attention for many years and of which the MS. was in great part ready at the time of his unexpected death in 1786—if so, the botanical world has been the poorer through the want of Hope's book.

But if Hope did not give cause by published contributions to natural knowledge for his recognition in promoting the advance of Botany, he has always been remembered with gratitude for services of administration which he was peculiarly fitted to render and which profoundly affected the study of Botany in Edinburgh.

John Hope was born 10th May, 1725. The son of Robert Hope, a surgeon in Edinburgh, whose father had become one of the Senators of the College of Justice with the title of Lord Rankeillour. Educated at a famous school in Dalkeith, John Hope, who early showed a liking for Botany, entered the University of Edinburgh as a medical student and became a pupil of Alston. His botanical inclinations tempted him to break the course of his medical studies in Edinburgh to study Botany under Bernard de Jussieu in Paris. Returning to Scotland he graduated in Medicine from the University of Glasgow in 1750, joined the Royal College of Physicians in Edinburgh and began medical practice, giving to Botany such time as could be spared from the many ties of a successful practice. In 1760 Alston died, and John Hope became his successor, first of all in 1761 as King's Botanist at Holyrood and subsequently as Professor of Botany and Materia Medica in the University.

Soon after appointment Hope recognised that to continue to hold "colleges" in Materia Medica meant spoliation of his botanical work. The time had come for a separation of the two subjects of Botany and Materia Medica. Problems of the former now pressing were not those specially relating to medicinal plants. He therefore managed to carry through an arrangement by which he retained a chair as Professor of Medicine and Botany, and a new Professorship of Materia Medica was created. The importance of this step for botanical progress was great—it was not merely a question of time occupied but of scientific outlook.

Another movement in the direction of concentration of effort in the cause of Botany was initiated by Hope early in his official career—that for the creation of a new Botanic Garden in a locality outside the immediate influence of town atmosphere, in which the collections distributed over the Holyrood and Town Gardens could be combined. He accomplished his design, and not only this, but obtained from the Crown a permanent endowment for the new Garden. This was no small achievement—but the omens were favourable, for those patrons of science the Earl of Bute and, later, the Duke of Portland, were in power when the Professor made use of the great influence which his family possessed to secure his ends. A spreading city in time made the location of Hope's new Garden unsuitable, and it was transferred to the present site; but it was the effort by Hope which gave the Botanic Garden, and through it Botany, a status among institutions requiring subsidy and maintenance by Government in Scotland, and the obligation so imposed has been upheld notwithstanding an attempt in later years on the part of the Government to get rid of it—an attempt which the short-sighted policy of the University nearly allowed to succeed.

Hope's duties in his University Chair required of him, in addition to his botanical work, clinical teaching in the Hospital, and he also engaged in practice—this for a livelihood—and took active share in the affairs of the Royal College of Physicians, of which he was President at the time of his death, which occurred in 1786. Botany could therefore claim but a portion of his time.

Having established the new Garden, he laboured with assiduity to lay it out effectively, and then to enrich it with plants. His own ardour and enthusiasm impressed others, and his pupils in all parts of the world contributed to making the Garden a renowned collection of the rarest plants. Here Hope met his students, and here he carried out his many physiological experiments which gave them instruction.