Ray Society in 1869. Although the author never had leisure to prepare a second edition, he furnished many additions to the German version published in 1886, and in 1893, he prepared a descriptive catalogue of the specimens of vegetable teratology in the museum of the Royal Colleg4 of Surgeons. On the death of Lindley, its founder, in November 1865, Masters, whose elder brother William was associated with the 'Gardeners' chronicle' at its establishment in 1841, was appointed principal editor of that journal, and henceforth the horticultural side of botany was his dominant interest for life. Under his direction the paper maintained a high standard. Botanists of eminence were among the writers, and he encouraged beginners. Masters acted as secretary to the International Horticultural Congress of 1866, and edited its 'Proceedings.' Out of the large surplus, Lindley's library was purchased for the nation and vested in trustees, of whom Masters was chairman, whilst 1000l. was given to the Gardeners' Royal Benevolent Institution, in which Masters always took keen interest. He was an assiduously active supporter of the Royal Horticultural Society, and succeeded Sir Joseph Dalton Hooker [q. v. Suppl. II] as chairman of the scientific committee. He kept in close touch with the progress of horticulture on the Continent.
Masters continued to work at pure botany, studying in the Kew herbarium from 1865. He was a large contributor to Lindley and Moore's 'Treasury of Botany' (1866; revised edit. 1873), elaborated the Malvaceae and allied orders and the passion-flowers for Oliver's 'Flora of Tropical Africa' (vol. i. 1868; vol. ii. 1871), and the passion-flowers for the 'Flora Brasiliensis' (1872); and after much study, prepared a monograph on the same family Restlacea; for De Candolle's supplement to the 'Prodromus' (1878). On the conifers, which divided his chief attention with the passion-flowers, he wrote in the 'Journals' of the Linnean and Horticultural Societies, the 'Journal of Botany,' and in the 'Gardeners' Chronicle,' and in 1892 he presided over the Conifer Conference of the Horticultural Society. He also contributed to Hooker's 'Flora of British India' and to his edition of Harvey's 'South African Plants,' and to Sir William Thiselton-Dyer's 'Flora Capensis.'
As lecturer and examiner, Masters knew the requirements of students, and met them successfully in thorough revisions of Henfrey's 'Elementary Course of Botany,' which he brought abreast of the time (2nd edit. 1870; 3rd edit. 1878, with the section on fungi rewritten by George Milne Murray [q. v. Suppl. II]; 4th edit, in 1884, with the eectionfl relating to the cryptogamia reritten by Alfred William Bennett [q. v. Suppl. II]). Masters also published two primers, 'Botany for Beginners' (1872) and 'Plant Life' (1883), both of which were translated into French, German, and Russian, and he contributed articles on horticulture and other subjects to 'Encyclopædia Britannica' (9th edit.).
Masters was elected a fellow of the Royal Society in 1870, and a correspondent of the Institute of France in 1888; and was also a chevalier of the order of Leopold. He died at the Mount, Ealing, on 30 May 1907. His body was cremated at Woking. In 1858 he married Ellen, daughter of William Tress, by whom he had four children. His wife and two daughters survived him.
His services have been commemorated by the endowment of an annual series of Masters lectures in connection with the Royal Horticultural Society.
[Gardeners' Chronicle, xli. (1907), pp. 368, 377, 398, 418, by William Betting Hemsley (with two portraits); Kew Bulletin. 1907, pp. 325-334, with bibliography.]
MATHESON, GEORGE (1842–1906), theologian and hymn writer, known as 'the blind preacher,' born at 39 Abbotsford Place, Glasgow, on 27 March 1842, was the eldest son in the family of five sons and three daughters of George Matheson, a prosperous Glasgow merchant. His mother, Jane Matheson, his father's second cousin, was the eldest daughter of John Mathwon of the Fereneze Print Works, Banfaead. As a child he suffered much from defective eyesight, and while a boy he became blind. This calamity did not deter him from an early resolve to enter the ministry.
After attending two private schools, he proceeded in 1853 to Glasgow Academy, where, notwithstanding his disability, he gained a competent knowledge of the classics, French, and German, and carried off many prizes. At Glasgow University, which he entered in 1857, he had a distinguished career, graduating B.A. in 1861, the last occasion on which the degree was granted, with 'honourable distinction in philosophy,' and proceeding M.A. in 1862. In the latter year he passed to the divinity hall, where he was much influenced by John Caird [q. v. Suppl. I].
