BRITTEN (James, 1846-1924, F.L.S., Editor of the Journal of Botany for almost 45 Years)

Autograph Letter Signed to 'My dear Sir',  (Robert Morton MIDDLETON , jr., F.L.S., F.Z.S., 1846-1909, English shipbroker and botanist), saying he has "no letter of Card. Wiseman ... but have an autograph somewhere ... And though I am often thrown in with Cardinal Manning, I have had very few of his letters, and those are always snapped up ... Many thanks for the [plant] names - always welcome - Would there be a chance of getting for our Museum Herbarium a wild specimen of Cypripedium?", the writing paper embossed with (in Latin) 'The night cometh when no man can work', 3 sides 8vo., Isleworth, 23rd November

Britten studied medicine, was at Kew 1869-1871, and from 1871 worked in the Botanical department of the British Museum. He compiled with Robert Holland the valuable 'Dictionary of English Plant Names', 1878-1886, and with G.S. Boulger the 'Biographical Index of British and Irish Botanists', 1893, which had first appeared in the Journal of Botany.
Middleton was employed at one time by the Hartlepools Shipowners' Society. About 1886 he and his wife settled in South Pittsburg, Tennessee, at the foot of the Cumberland Mountains. He corresponded with many leading naturalists, collected autographs, and presented a herbarium of some 3000 American and other specimens to McGill University in December 1890, returning permanently to England in 1892. With his wife and sister he spent 1904-1907 as a missionary in Chile. Again returning, he took a house in Kew and was a Temporary Assistant at the Natural History Museum till 1909.

Item Date:  1882

Stock No:  13904      £40

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