By: G.W. Reynolds
Date: 1950
Publisher: Aloes of South Africa Book Fund
Signed Limited 1st Edition No. 165
This edition is bound in leather with gold gilt to the front and spine.
The book is in mint condition with no blemishes whatsoever.
When you buy the book you will receive a colour scanned copy in PDF and Word formats.
FOREWORD BY FIELD-MARSHAL THE RIGHT HON. J. C. SMUTS, O.M., C.H., P.C., LL.D., F.R.S.
Mr. G. W. Reynolds has asked me to write a foreword to his great work "The Aloes of South Africa". I do so with much pleasure because I firmly believe that anyone who adds to the knowledge of our vegetation and thereby creates public interest in it, is a public benefactor. By so doing he is helping to preserve the country's life blood-its living mantle, the flora on which the fauna of the land depends. Through man's selfish greed and mania for killing, we have lost much of our very remarkable and indeed unique fauna, and unless a new spirit of real love for wildlife is born, we shall lose still more. We must, therefore, see to it that the gems of our flora do not share the same fate, and this work of Reynolds should do much to save and preserve a most attractive group of typical South African plants.
The genus Aloe, chiefly on account of its striking beauty, has received considerable attention in the past, mostly from non-resident botanists, many of whom were unfamiliar with the country in which the plants grew. Reynolds has not only reviewed most exhaustively the work of all the early collectors and writers on the genus Aloe, but he has also provided the reader and research worker with a most complete up-to-date bibliographical record of the genus which, in itself, is no mean undertaking. But he has done much more than this. If one refers to the genus Aloe in the Flora Capensis, one finds that the habitat of considerably more than half of the species described there was unknown. The habitat is merely given as "South Africa without locality". Reynolds has hunted out all the unknown localities of these Aloes, and not only has he established them all, but he has actually photographed all the now known species of South African Aloes in their natural surroundings-a most valuable piece of work for future students of ecology. In the past we looked upon Salm-Dyck's beautifully coloured monograph on the Aloes as a remarkable performance, but I have no hesitation in saying that this work of Reynolds will now become the masterpiece of the genus.
Since the subsequent publication of the relevant volume of the Flora Capensis dealing with the Aloes, for which Baker was responsible, substantial additions have been made, both to the number of known species, and our knowledge of the genus generally, mostly by Dr. I. B. Pole Evans whose name, among other workers in this field, deserves special mention in this connection. The present state of our knowledge is now brilliantly reflected in this monograph of Reynolds, and I have no hesitation in saying that it will be generally recognised as the authoritative masterpiece of the genus.
Reynolds achievement is essentially a labour of love for nature by a man with an indefatigable spirit, who has spared no pains or expense to reach his objective. The author, in his search for Aloes, has explored almost every hole and corner of South Africa, wherever they grew, whether it was on the top of Hell's Kloof in the Richtersveld, or at the bottom of The Hell, deep in the Olifants River Valley in the Transvaal. In this search he has shown himself to be an intrepid explorer, and it is clear, too, from his magnificent colour photographs, that he has completely mastered the technique of colour photography, and has set a high standard for plant photography in this country, which it is hoped will do much to make better known the country's wealth of floral beauty.
Both from a scientific and an artistic point of view Reynolds has, in my opinion, made a contribution of national importance to our Flora. And I have therefore special pleasure in introducing and commending it to the public.