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Correspondence of Elizabeth Atwater and G. W.
Clinton |
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The Correspondence of Elizabeth Atwater (1812‑1878) and George William Clinton (1807‑1885) Edited by P. M. Eckel, P.O. Box 299, Missouri Botanical
Garden, St. Louis, Missouri, 63166‑0299; email: mailto:patricia.eckel@mobot.org 1868 Vol.5 no. 134 [B 94] [embossed cameo of a woman's head] Clifton House Chicago June 2nd 1868 Hon. George W. Clinton, Dear Sir, I owe you an apology for having forwarded to your
address a package of plants unheralded. I availed myself of Mrs. [Cossans' ?] courtesy in
transmitting them. She left us without premonition ‑ allowing me no
opportunity for addressing you at that time. I thought it simply possible that you might have
no specimens of the Cucumber tree, or the South American air plant. A few days since I plucked or I might say exhumed,
the roots were so manifold, and so tenacious, ‑ the most stupendous
plant of the Dodecatheon species I have ever seen. It is now in the press for
which I was compelled to resort to my large engraving Portfolio! I also found
the Water‑Ranunculus very abundant, with an exquisite white, aquatic
plant which I have not before seen. I wish I might have something new to send you; as that
is impossible, I will send any duplicate specimens of plants which you may
desire for exchange with other Societies. Your favor of Feb'y 3d acknowledging receipt of the
Foreign ferns which I forwarded to you was duly received. I am gratified to
know they proved acceptable. Believe me, Sir, very respectfully yours, Elizabeth E. Atwater. Recd June 3 wrote June 5 [Ranunculus
aquatilis L. var. capillaceus (Thuill.) DC.,White Water Crowfoot. rare in
western New York today. ‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑ Vol.5 no. 158 [B 70] Clifton House, Chicago, July 27th, 1868 Hon. George W. Clinton, Dear Sir, I take up my pen this morning for the purpose of extending
to you an invitation to be present at the "Scientific Convention"
in our City ‑ occurring in August. Mr. Atwater bids me express to you
in his name a cordial wish that you may be pleased to come to Chicago at that
time, August 5th, and make the Clifton House your home so long as you can
make the time pass agreeably. Our annual trip to the Seaside having been necessarily
delayed on account of severe indisposition of my husband we are contemplating
an immediate departure ‑ and may not be here to receive you. You will
therefore regard yourself as in an ordinary Hotel, and express your wants
without reserve ‑ inviting, with the perfect freedom, any friends whom
you may chance to meet to dine with you. We hope, Sir, you will gratify us and the Society by accepting
our invitation. Dr. Stimpson, our Secretary, adds his personal request to our
own, for your presence, Believe me, with esteem Respectfully Yours Elisabeth E. Atwater Recd July 28 ‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑ Vol.5 no. 189 [B 36] [Large embossed "A"] Clifton House, Chicago Dec'r 4th, 1868 Hon. G. W. Clinton, Dear Sir, I have the pleasure of sharing with you a few plants
from Switzerland. The wife of our British Consul, who is my particular
friend, has spent the summer of '68, on the mountains and in the valleys of
that beautiful country, and has been indefatigable in culling plants for me.
Riding upon mules ‑ as is the custom for tourists through the
"Passes" does not facilitate botanising. Mrs. Wilkins rode with her
portfolio suspended from her neck ‑ consequently could not produce as
satisfactory results with her specimens as she desired. I would be glad to
share more fully with you, but in many instances she has not supplied me with
duplicates. The rare little plant, Asplenium Septentrionale from "St.
Gothards Pass," I feel assured will please you. Another friend, Miss E. P. Stevens, has recently
returned from South America bringing quite a variety of plants, pressed under
equally disadvantageous circumstances. Her residence during the last year has
been at Guasipati, in the State of Guiana, 180 miles across the Plains, on
mules, from Angustura. She brought specimens for the Smithsonian Institute,
The Chicago Academy of Science, and for myself, and desired me to present the
remainder to you. There being no Botany of the Country she sends the plants
without their names. If they will be of any service to you, she will not have
prepared them in vain. Miss S. sailed last week again, with her brother, for
the same locality, to remain another year, and, having supplied herself with
the requisite materials of paper &c., hopes to be more successful with
future specimens. Will you do me the favor of acknowledging by a few
lines, her courtesy? ‑ which I will enclose in my letter to her. To the above mentioned I have added a few Greenport
plants, which I picked up at the seaside, scarcely worthy your acceptance. I
found the Osmunda regalis at G. but not in fruit. I enclose specimens of
Menyanthes, from near Chicago, which I plucked with my own hands,
notwithstanding Dr. Lapham says "the plant is said to grow only in bogs
on which a man may venture with safety." I regret to say to you that I plucked, I am almost
certain, the only plants of the Heather which could be found on Nantucket
Island, and I fear that, in my excitement, I so successfully dislodged the
roots, no more will ever be found. I forwarded a specimen to your friend Mr.
Peck, of Albany, and trust it reached him safely. Our proximity to Christmas must be my apology for the
evident haste in which the parcel, which I forward by express, has been
prepared. Your forbearance, also, for this prolix note. Believe me Sir, with
Mr. Atwaters kind regards, respectfully yours, Elisabeth E. Atwater Recd Dec. 6 [Angostura:
officially called Ciudad Bolivar, is an inland river port on the narrows
(Spanish word angosturas) of the Orinoco river above its delta, in the
eastern portion of Venezuela. Guasipati must be in what is now British
Guiana. I believe there are specimens
with the Guasipati label at BUF. In the Index Herbariorum Part II (6)
'Collectors' by I. H. Vegter, 1986 (Regnum Vegetabile vol. 114, Utrecht,
there is only a reference to an "E. P. Stevens" whose specimens
from Tropical America are at the New York Botanical Garden. The fact that
only the initials are given, nor birth and death dates, suggests that the
compiler did not know this was our Elizabeth P. Two Clinton letters from Miss
Elizabeth P. derive from an address in San Francisco, California. Perhaps we
might venture to suggest that Elizabeth's sister might be the Alice F.
Stevens in the IH:C, who collected in North America "ferns & fern
allies; Angiospermae from Calif. & Wyo." Her specimens are at HNH,
that is, at Dartmouth College, Hanover, New Hampshire.] [The
first of two letters to Clinton by Stevens is as follows: Vol.
6 no. 203 [L 5] Brooklyn
Apr. 12th 1870 To G. W. Clinton, Pres. of
the Buf. S. of N. Sciences Dear
Sir, Your
favor of the 2d inst. arrive in due time, but owing to my absence I did not
immediately receive it. I
hasten to answer, to express my thanks to the Buffalo Society of Natural
Sciences, for its kind remembrance & acknowledgement, of the very slight
donation from me, in so flattering a form, as the offered membership from
this society. The knowledge, that the donation is duly appreciated, is
sufficient reward. But since it was thought proper by the Society to place my
name among the honored & the learned, although, I feel the honor is
beyond my desert, I gratefully accept it, & will endeavor to fulfil its
duties by any effort that I maybe able to make. At
present, not being possessed of a photograph, I postpone the sending of one,
until such time as I shall be able to procure one. Gratified
that my name & face shall be among the Savans of my native state,
although not claiming to be a sapient, but only a lover, I am very gratefully
and respectfully yours, Elizabeth
P. Stevens Recd Ap. 14 The
second letter by Stevens is as follows: Vol.7
no. 155 [E 76 ‑ two pieces of paper, one penciled inventory number]
[Stationery with small floral emblem in upper left, all bordered in black] San
Francisco Feb. 2d, [18]71 Mr. Clinton Dear
Sir Your
very kind epistle was received in due time. I am afraid you will find me a
very poor correspondent, indeed, I think that you have already sufficient
knowledge of me, to see, that I am fearfully procrastinating ‑ even to
impoliteness. In extenuation, I will say that I am not a ready writer &
wait for the mood. I am however truly grateful for your kind offer of
correspondence & for your desire to be useful to me in the pursuit of
botany. I
should be delighted to sit at your feet & learn wisdom & to have my S.A.
plants under your analysis. Very many of them I cannot tell where to place.
Some I have been enabled to arrange according to their families (i.e., the
Myrtaceae, mimosas, cassias, passifloras &c. My knowledge of botany is
superficial, being chiefly, what I gained in my youth from the Linnean System
& I do not hope, now, to become scientific. Still it is a pleasure to
gather plants & analyze, & to this end, I am armed with the old North
American Botany, Wood, & Greys [sic] last edition. I do not expect to
make so many prizes as in the Tropics, as I am again shut up in a city,
still, I shall gather all that I find on these barren hills, & hope, by
& by, to make some visits to the country, where, I am told, I shall find
much that is new. I have already gathered a few of the musci & of the sea
plants of the bay. Some of the latter are dissimilar to those I have seen
from the Atlantic coast, resembling some plates of English sea plants that I
find in a book, entitled British Seaweeds drawn from Prof. Harveys Phycologia
Brittanica. I
am glad that my poor plants gave [second
paper] so much pleasure & only regret that they were not finer specimens.
You praise me too much, for indeed, I made no sacrifices either in gathering,
preserving or giving. Would I not be an anomaly among the lovers of these
"dried leaves" were I not willing that those who appreciate them
should also enjoy what may be new to them? As
yet, I find no lichens, except those growing on the live oaks & laurels
that are found on these hills. I
have mentioned the text books that I have. Any other works that you will
recommend for the study of the cryptogams, as well as, all advise will be
gladly received by your obliged friend Elizabeth
P. Stevens Recd Feb. 11 about 14‑16th inclosed some lichens from Miss.
W. and wrote her, but not fully.] ‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑ |
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