[[1]]
Kew
J[anuar]y 14/[18]76
My Dear [Asa] Gray
I am now writing to thank Waldo Ross for a nice barrel of Apples for which he tells me I have to thank in part your kind thoughts -- they have come in most acceptably[?] I assure you at this season of "boys at home".
I have yours’ of Dec[ember] 6 -- too long unanswered. Thanks for the second copy of Aestivation *1 which I quite agree to -- I only wish that the thing had been put before B[entham?]. & I in the same way earlier in the day.
[[2]] No you never explained to me before that element in the publication of Miscellanea -- viz the keeping material out of bad hands; it outweighs all others in my mind. & I bow to the ground before it.
I am very glad to see your notes in Decaisne[']s excellent Pirus essay. D[ecaisne's]: work is always beautiful, but over--wrought. [Henri Ernest] Baillon has somewhere insisted on a grave error in some of D[ecaisne]’s observations: the position of the ovules --I forget what.
I find Baillon[']s work on Phytolacceae, which I have just finished, a wretched réchauffé of Moq[uin].Tandon
[[3]] which is itself very bad. Baillon’s Histoire [des Plantes] is a damnatory work --
I am puzzled what to do with Stegnosperma -- you know we keep up Paronychieae & have put Limeum & Gisekia [Gisechia] into Mollugineae (Ficordeae).
I have done Nyotaginea & had a dreadful task with Mirabilis Oxybaphus & Co. & with Bentham[']s agreement[?] kept Mirabilis for the big flowers & Oxybaphus for the small! -- a wretched compromise. I will if you care for it send you the clavis. I have examined every species of all.
I think that your var[ieties]. of O. Cervantesii, are good species, & both
[[4]] different from O. Cervantesii.
I send note herewith.
I am now at Paronychieae. Bentham at Labiatae which finish the vol[ume]. We are printing Acanthaceae which will be followed by the Verbenaceae.
You perplex me sorely by your entreaty that I should cross the water to you. How can I with 6 children on my hands? Hardy is I expect going over in July -- & I should so much like to accompany him. Though he would go to New--York I to you. As it is I am sore put to to[sic] keep matters straight here. Parish[?] is all I could hope for, but
[[5]] Diggs has just given us another grant to print -- the Catalogue of Scientific Papers for the decade 1863--73 (it will cost about £2000 I suppose). There are near 100,000 entries.
Bentham is just recovered from a cold that had an ugly appearance; & is I think all right again.
Munro has settled near Taunton.
Thomson has been very very ill, he is quite a valetudinarian now, living near Maidstone.
Darwin is very well for him.
Ever dear Gray | Affect[ionatel]y y[ou]rs | Jos D Hooker [signature]
ENDNOTES
1. Aestivation and Terminology. Gray, Asa (1875).
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