A global history of botany and plant collecting in 18th century based on original research in many languages.Joseph Banks, botanist for Cook’s great voyage to the South Pacific on The Endeavour, was a child of the Enlightenment. He believed that reason, in the shape of scientific knowledge, was the key to political and economic progress. He was also what Malcolm Gladwell terms ‘a connector’. In the second half of the 18th century, people who wanted something done in science and exploration went...
