Philosophical transactions, Vol. L. Part I. For the year 1757. / Giving some account of the present undertakings, studies, and labours, of the ingenious, in many considerable parts of the world.

by Various; Royal Society

LV. Remarks upon the Letter of Mr. John Ellis, F.R.S. to Philip Carteret Webb, Esq; F.R.S. printed in the Philosophical Transactions, Vol. xlix. Part ii. p. 806. By Mr. Philip Miller, F.R.S.

Read Dec. 15, 1757.

THE paper of mine, which was read before the Royal Society on the 8th of May 1755, and afterward printed in the xlixth volume of the Philosophical Transactions[208], was written at the request of Mr. Watson; who informed me, that a letter from the Abbé Mazeas to the reverend Dr. Hales had been communicated to the Royal Society, in which it was mentioned, that the Abbé Sauvages had made a discovery of the juice of the Carolina Toxicodendron staining linen of a permanent black. But Mr. Watson said, that the letter, he thought, required a careful perusal before it was printed; and he wished I would confirm it. I told him, if the letter was put into my hands, I would look it over, and deliver my opinion of it.

Accordingly Dr. Birch delivered the letter to me; and, upon reading it, I found, that tho' this might be a discovery to those two gentlemen; yet, as it had been mentioned in several printed books long before, I thought it might not be for the reputation of the Royal Society to have it printed as such in their Transactions.

This was my motive for writing that paper: in which I have not endeavoured to depreciate the discovery of the Abbé Sauvages, but have only mentioned what had occurred to me in those books of botany, where that shrub is taken notice of. And as the knowlege of it, and the method of collecting the varnish, might be of service to the inhabitants of the British colonies in America, I took the liberty of adding the account given of it by Dr. Kœmpfer.

Mr. Ellis, in his letter to Mr. Webb, asserts, that the American Toxicodendron is not the same with Kœmpfer's Arbor vernicifera legitima. This assertion of his makes it necessary to lay before the Society the authorities, upon which I have grounded my belief, that they are the same. But it may not be amiss first to take notice, that the shrub mentioned by the Abbé Sauvages is the same with that, which the gardeners about London call the Poison-ash. The title of it, mentioned by the Abbé Sauvages, was given by myself to that shrub, in a catalogue of trees and shrubs, which was printed in the year 1730; before which it had no generical title applied to it. And about the same time I sent several of the plants to Paris and Holland with that title, which I had raised a few years before from seeds, which were sent by Mr. Catesby from Carolina.

And altho' this shrub had not been reduced to any genus before, yet it had been some years growing in the gardens of the Bishop of London at Fulham, at Mr. Reynardson's at Hillenden, Mr. Darby's at Hoxton, and in the Chelsea garden, which were raised from seeds sent by Mr. Banister from Virginia; two of which were growing at Chelsea in the year 1722, when the care of that Garden was intrusted to me.

The first intimation I had of the American shrub being the same with Dr. Kœmpfer's true varnish-tree, was from the late Dr. William Sherard, in the year 1726, when that gentleman desired me to bring him a specimen of the American Toxicodendron from the Chelsea garden; which I accordingly did: and then the Doctor, and Dr. Dillenius, compared it with a dried specimen in the collection of the former, which was gathered in Japan, and which, if I remember right, he told me he received from Dr. Kœmpfer some years before. It appeared to those two gentlemen, that they were the same; and their skill in the science of botany was never doubted.

About a year after this, I carried a specimen of the American Toxicodendron to an annual meeting of some botanists at Sir Hans Sloane's in Bloomsbury; where there were present Mr. Dale of Braintree, Mr. Joseph Miller, Mr. Rand, and some others; which was then compared with Dr. Kœmpfer's specimen, whose collection Sir Hans Sloane had purchased: and it was the opinion of every one present, that they were the same. Nor has any one doubted of their being so, who has compared the American shrub with Kœmpfer's figure and description of his true varnish-tree, but Mr. Ellis.

And now give me leave to examine his reasons for differing in opinion from every late botanist, who has mentioned this shrub.