Darwin’s Mentor by S. M. Walters and E. A. Stow, Cambridge University Press,
£40, ISBN 0521591465
DARWIN is such a towering figure in Victorian science that it is easy to
overlook contemporary notables. The mentor of Darwin’s Mentor was John Stevens
Henslow, remembered mainly as the founder of the Botanic Garden in Cambridge.
Though consumed with ambition to travel abroad as a young man, he was powerfully
dissuaded from such a course by his family and remained to lead an academic life
as professor of botany in the university.
Henslow was hardly a dashing figure—he is perhaps best described as…
