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216
Hereditary Genius
Herschel, Sir William, continued—
[3 P.] Two of his grandsons have already made a name in the scientific world—
Professor Alexander Herschel as a writer on meteorites, and Lieut. John
Herschel, the first of his year at Addiscombe, who took charge of the
expedition organized in 1868 by the Royal Society, to observe the total eclipse
in India. The other son, William, a Bengal civilian, was first of his year at
Haileybury. Musical gifts are strongly hereditary in the Herschel family.
Hooker, Sir William; botanist; late Director and the promoter of the Royal Gardens
at Kew; author of numerous works on systematic botany.
S. Dr. Joseph Dalton Hooker, botanist and physicist, Director of the Royal
Gardens at Kew; formerly naturalist to Sir J. Ross's Antarctic expedition, and
afterwards traveller in the Sikkim Himalayas. His mother's father, g., was
Dawson Turner, the botanist; and his cousins are, 2 uS., Giffard Palgrave,
Arabian explorer and author of a work on Arabia, and Francis Palgrave, a well-
known writer on literature, poetry, and art.
Humboldt, Alexander, Baron von; scientific traveller and philosopher, and a man of
enormous scientific attainments. He had an exceedingly vigorous constitution,
and required very little sleep. His first work on natural history was published
aet. 21; d. aet. 90, working almost to the last. He concluded his “Kosmos “aet.
82.
B. Wilhelm von Humboldt, philologist of the highest order, classical critic, and
diplomatist. The different tastes of the two brothers were conspicuous at the
university where they studied together—Alexander for science, Wilhelm for
philology.
Hunter, John; the most eminent of English anatomists; Surgeon-General of the
Army, Surgeon Extraordinary to the King. His education was almost wholly
neglected in his youth. He was a cabinet-maker between aet. 17 and 20; then he
offered himself as assistant in the dissecting room to his elder brother William
(see below). He rapidly distinguished himself, and ultimately formed the
famous Hunterian Museum.
B. William Hunter, President of the College of Physicians and
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