Memorials, Journal, and Botanical Correspondence of Charles Cardall Babington. (Macmillan
and Bowes, Cambridge. 105. 6d. net.) —This is a book which we shall describe rather than criticise. C. C. Babington belonged to a family of great antiquity, traceable to Northumberland, but settled since the sixteenth century at B,othley Temple. He graduated at St. John's College, Cambridge, in 1830. In those days science did not receive academical rewards. Even the professorships that had to do with it were not given to experts, but as the rewards of distinctions gained elsewhere or by personal or popular favour (so Adam Sedgwick became Professor of Geology when he was absolutely ignorant of the subject). This did not damp C. C. Babington's zeal. He devoted himself to his own study of botany, and helped others to do the same. He kept the lamp alight, though the University did not furnish the oil. In 1862, when the Professorship of Botany became vacant, he was, of course, elected to it. He held it to his death, having been meanwhile (in 1832) elected a Professorial Fellow of his own College. He died July 22nd, 1895. This is a bare outline of the facts and dates of his life. Its details are filled in by numerous tributes from sur- viving colleagues and friends. He had outlived, indeed, all his contemporaries—he died the oldest of the resident graduates— but there were not a few who knew him, and they, themselves laud ati viri, such as Professor J. C. B. Mayor, Professor Liveing, and Dr. H. C. G. Moule among them, speak his praise with one voice. As a botanist, though he gave no great work to the world, he was, by the common consent of his pupils, a singularly inspiring and interesting teacher. The University has never been better served by any one of its professors, and he did not forget to do what he could to make his work live after him. He bequeathed to it his botanical books—they had been deposited in the library for general use long before his death—and his herbarium, consisting of four hundred thousand carefully preserved specimens. His religious convictions were strong, and showed themselves in practical shape. Missionary work had, in particular, his liveliest sympathy. A journal, kept without interruption from November 2nd, 1825, for sixty-five years (the last entry bears date September 10th, 1891), gives the leading facts of his life and work. The volume is completed by his "botanical correspondence," beginning with a letter to William Hooker, dated November 24th, 1834, and ending with one written almost exactly a year before his death.
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