(Vol. vii., p. 428.)
Of old Jacob Bobart, who originally came from Brunswick, Granger (_Biog.
Hist._, vol. v. p. 287., edit. 1824) gives us the following account:
"Jacob Bobart, a German, whom Plot styles 'an excellent gardener and
botanist,' was, by the Earl of Danby, founder of the physic-garden at
Oxford, appointed the first keeper of it. He was author of _Catalogus
Plantarum Horti Medici Oxoniensis, scil. Latino-Anglicus et
Anglico-Latinus_: Oxon. 1648, 8vo. One singularity I have heard of him
from a gentleman of unquestionable veracity, that on rejoicing days he
used to have his beard tagged with silver. The same gentleman informed
me, that there is a portrait of him in the possession of one of the
corporation at Woodstock. He died the 4th of February, 1679, in the
eighty-first year of his age. He had two sons, Tillemant and Jacob, who
both belonged to the physic-garden. It appears that the latter
succeeded him in his office."
There is a very fine print of the elder Bobart, now extremely scarce, "D.
Loggan del., M. Burghers, sculp." It is a quarto of the largest size.
Beneath the head, which is dated 1675, is this distich:
"Thou German prince of plants, each year to thee
Thousands of subjects grant a subsidy."
In John Evelyn's _Diary_, under the date Oct. 24, 1664, is the following
entry:
"Next to Wadham, and the physic garden, where were two large
locust-trees, and as many platani (plane-trees), and some rare plants
under the culture of old Bobart."
The editor of the last edition, after repeating part of Granger's note, and
mentioning the portrait, adds:
"There is a small whole-length in the frontispiece of _Vertumnus_, a
poem on that garden. In this he is dressed in a long vest, with a
beard. One of his family was bred up at college in Oxford; but quitted
his studies for the profession of the whip, driving one of the Oxford
coaches (his own property) for many years with great credit. In 1813 he
broke his leg by an accident; and in 1814, from the respect he had
acquired by his good conduct, he was appointed by the University to the
place of one of the Esquire Beadles."
_Vertumnus_, the poem mentioned in the above note, was addressed to Mr.
Jacob Bobart, in 1713, by Dr. Evans. It is a laudatory epistle on the
botanical knowledge of the Bobarts; and we learn from it that Jacob, the
younger, collected a _Hortus Siccus_ (a collection of plants pasted upon
paper, and kept dry in a book) in twenty volumes.
"Thy _Hortus Siccus_ ...
In tomes twice ten, that world immense!
By thee compiled at vast expense."
The broadsides about which H. T. BOBART inquires are of the greatest
possible rarity. They were the production of Edmund Gayton, the author of
_Festivious Notes on Don Quixote_, &c. Copies may be seen in the Ashmolean
Library, under the press-marks Nos. 423. and 438., but I think not in any
other repository of a like nature.
Among the Ashmolean MSS. (No. 36, art. 296.) is a poem of 110 lines "Upon
the most hopeful and ever-flourishing Sprouts of Valour, the indefatigable
Centrys of the Physick-Garden." This, I apprehend, is a MS. copy of the
first broadside mentioned by your correspondent.
I shall merely add, the Bobarts, father and son, were personal friends of
Ashmole and Ray, and that, in all probability, among their correspondence
much curious and minute information might be obtained.