NEILL

According to Duncan's entry in the Oxford DNB, 'In 1809 he founded the Caledonian Horticultural Society, and in later years he was actively occupied in promoting the establishment of a public experimental garden.' 2pp, 4to. In good condition, on aged paper, creased. The recipient is not named, and the letter begins: 'Although I have already often interrupted important business of State, yet I trust you will once more, forgive an Octogenarian, when he can plead, that his principal temptation, to transgression, is an earnest desire to promote the publick good -'.

4pp., 12mo. Bifolium. Good, on lightly-aged grey paper. Gray begins by thanking the Colonel for allowing him to have a 'cursory glance' at his 1901 biography of his father the Liberal politician Hugh Culling Eardley Childers. Gray intends to get it 'from one of the Libraries & go over it more carefully. It is full of interest to me particularly the period of yr Fathers residence in Melbourne in Govr. Arthurs time whom he found intractable but liked Genl. McArthur whom I knew well & Col Neill with whom I often stayed at Hawthorn'.