Page:Makers of British botany.djvu/95

 STEPHEN HALES 1677—1761

FRANCIS DARWIN

An error corrected—Hales' scientific contemporaries—Physiology or Physics—Hales the Founder of the experimental method in Physiology—His style—Cambridge days—Teddington—Vegetable Staticks—Experiments described—Transpiration—Root Pressure—Assimilation—Practical application to greenhouses—Distribution of growth first measured—Hales' other activities—Sachs' tribute.

attempting to give a picture of any man's life and work it is well to follow the rule of the Dictionary of National Biography, and begin with the dates of his birth and death. Stephen Hales was born in 1677 and died in 1761, having had experiences of the reigns of seven sovereigns.

The authorities for the life of Hales are given in my article on him in the Dictionary of National Biography. Botanists in general probably take their knowledge of the main facts of his life from Sachs' History of Botany. It is therefore worth while to point out that both the original and the English translation (1890) contain the incorrect statement that Hales was educated at Christ's College, Cambridge, and that he held the living of Riddington, whereas he is one of the glories of Corpus, and was perpetual curate of Teddington. These inaccuracies however are trifles in relation to the great and striking merits of Sachs' History, a work which to my thinking exhibits the strength and brilliance of the author's mind as clearly as any of his more technical writings. Sachs was no niggling biographer, and his broad vigorous outlines must form the basis of what anyone, who follows him, has to say about the Botanists of a past day.