Botanist Edwin Hunt and the Hungarian Revolutionary Lajos Kossuth: Finding Comfort in Nature

June 17, 1869

On this day, the botanist Edwin Hunt collected the last known specimen of Arethusa bulbosa in the old Oriskany swamp in New York.

While researching Edwin Hunt, I found an article telling how he once collected flowers for the Hungarian Revolutionary Lajos Kossuth.

Kossuth was lamenting yet another political disappointment, and he told Edwin how nature consoled him:

In this sadness of my poor, distressed heart, I longed for some consolation.

 

The words of Chateaubriand came to my mind:

Happy those who love nature,

Her they shall find,

And shall not find but her in the days of adversity.

And so I turned to that sole consoler who never disappoints and never deceives.
 
The study of nature confirmed what my heart was longing to hope for.
 

A mild ray of peace and consolation fell on my sad soul as the cooling balm falls on the burning wound.