William Gardiner 1809-1852

William Gardiner was a poet botanist born in Dundee, Scotland in 1809. His formative years were spent as an apprentice umbrella maker but his real calling was his love of plants, particularly the art of making representative collections, which are immaculate in their presentation. His collections of bryophytes were made with great care and timing and in most cases sporangia are present. The majority of his collections are housed in the Local Studies Department of Dundee Central Library where they form part of the Lamb Collection. These web pages offer a great deal of insight into the background of his botanical excursions.
The Charterhouse Herbarium has many of his loose collections but also three volumes of his Illustrations of British Botany, bound and beautifully presented specimens of algae, lichens, mosses and vascular plants. Even his labels show his artistic side as the image below shows:

William Gardiners' labels with their stylized margins add not only the presentation and quality of his collections but also include detailed localities. His identification skills as a competent botanist mostly hold true today and annotations usually reflect just nomenclatural changes. The above collection of Cystopteris fragilis near Glamis, north of his home in Dundee.

Despite his humble roots he associated with many of the leading botanists of his time and dedicated a number of his works to popularizing botany and in particular mosses. His 'Twenty Lessons on British Mosses' takes the reader on a specimen based introduction of some of the principal genera. Interlaced with poetry Gardiner's work castigates those who look down on his bryophytes:

Those humble plants that clothe the rock,
Or green the sterile waste,
Of no importance seem to him
Who scanneth things in haste;

But these the first foundation lay
Of vegetative power,
And, but for these, we ne'er might have
A green tree or a flower.

Then, while we view the wond'rous wealth
The forest's shades disclose-
Or quaff the balm by meadows breathed,
Or garden's blushing rose-

Or walk in the lone path where Spring
Her primroses have strown-
Or thread the maze of Summer bower
Which Flora claims her own-

May we, amid the gorgeous scene,
Reflect from whence it sprung;
And ne'er, on humble things, contempt
Of ours fall from the tongue ;

For He whose wisdom plann'd the whole,
Ordained that they should be ;
And who the lowly moss dares spurn,
Insults God's majesty.

Gardiner dedicated the second edition of Twenty Lesson of British Mosses to Sir William Hooker whom purportedly offered him employment which he declined.
From a very working class background Gardiner sold his collections to supplement income and his lasting legacy is in their presentation and the fact that for old collections all the data that is so important for botanical research accompanies his specimens.