Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 05.djvu/312

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Bohler
304
Bohn

married. Jane, wife of 'Mr. Bohemus,' was buried at Hallaton 14 Dec. 1647; his wife Elizabeth was buried 10 July 1654; he married Hannah Vowe 27 Feb. 1656. By his wife Elizabeth he had a daughter Anne, baptised 12 March 1652; probably the Mrs. Ann Boheme buried at Walcot 20 Nov. 1695.

He published:

  1. 'A Christians Delight, or Morning-Meditations,' &c., London, 1654, 12mo (has Latin dedication to Sir Arthur Haselrig, signed 'Mauritius' Bohemus; the English title-page has 'Maritius.' The title-page incorrectly states the number of 'Meditations' as ninety-seven; there are ninety-eight, and an appendix makes up one hundred. Palmer, mistaking Calamy, makes this two works).
  2. 'The Pearle of Peace and Concord,' &c., London, 1665, 16mo (a translation of a German work by Dr. Bergius, published twenty years before, with an irenical aim in view of the differences among protestants; Bohemus dedicates his translation to Oliver Cromwell).

[Calamy's Account, 1713, p. 438; Calamy's Continuation, 1727, p. 594; Palmer's Nonconf. Memorial, 1802, ii. 887; Allg. Deut. Biog. 1875, ii. 386; Burial Register of Walcot, Lincolnshire.]

A. G.

BOHLER, JOHN (1797–1872), botanist, born at South Wingfield, near Alfreton, Derbyshire, 31 Dec. 1797, was a simple stocking-weaver, but his early instincts led him to gather plants, and he became a collector of medicinal plants for the doctors. He then took up the science of botany, and became an expert field botanist and microscopist, traversing England, Ireland, and Wales. In time he became acquainted with the 'habitats' of all our indigenous flowers, and made a special study of lichens. In 1835-7 he published 'Lichenes Britannici, or Specimens of the Lichens of Britain,' containing sixteen monthly fasciculi, each of eight actual specimens, collected and mounted by himself, with original descriptions, &c.—128 in all, at 3s. 6d. each—forming a valuable work which is now very scarce. The British Museum has no copy of it. About 1860 he explored Snowdon and the adjacent mountains and hills under the auspices of a botanical committee of the British Association. Later in life he became a great collector of rare fungi, gathered from their widely scattered localities throughout the land. Dr. Aveling's fine folio, 'Roche Abbey, Yorkshire,' London, 1870, has in the appendix 'A Flora of Roche Abbey,' by Bohler. He also compiled 'The Flora of Sherwood Forest' for Mr. Robert White's 'Worksop, the Dukeries, and Sherwood Forest,' Worksop, 1875, 4to, and arranged his materials in accordance with Hooker's 'Student's Flora.' He also contributed botanical papers and notes to various scientific journals. He died at Sheffield 24 Sept. 1872.

[Reliquary, xi. 212; White's Worksop, p. 303; Pritzel's Thesanros, p. 32; Jackson's Lit. of Botany, p. 243, and the writer's MS. notes.]

J. W.-G.

BOHN, HENRY GEORGE (1796–1884), bookseller and publisher, was the son of Henry Martin Bohn, a native of Munster, Westphalia, who, after learning the art of bookbinding in his native town, settled in 1795 in London, where he married a lady of Scotch parentage. By the introduction of certain new features of the bookbinding art he acquired a considerable connection, and after removing to 17 and 18 Henrietta Street, Covent Garden, he also established a business in second-hand books. The son Henry George was born 4 Jan. 1796. Immediately after leaving school he entered his father's business, but at a very early date his energetic and independent character showed itself. Some of his suggestions were not followed, and thereupon, leaving Henrietta Street, he accepted post in a mercantile house in the city. He made great progress there, but his father speedily persuaded him to return to the family roof, and until he was well over thirty years of age he took a leading part in the conduct of his father's business. As early as 1813, when Bohn was in his eighteenth year, he published in London a translation from the German of the romance of ‘Ferandino.’ His knowledge of languages was turned to account in trade, and he visited the chief continental cities to make purchases of rare and valuable foreign books. As his father declined to admit him into partnership, he resolved, after his marriage in 1831 to Elizabeth Simpkin, only child of William Simpkin, of the firm of Simpkin, Marshall, & Co., to commence business on his own account at 4 York Street, Covent Garden. Notwithstanding that his capital at starting was, it is stated, only 1,000l., supplemented with a second 1,000l. lent by a friend, his progress was rapid. He devoted his attention during the next ten years chiefly to the amassing of important and valuable old books. In 1841 he published a ‘“guinea catalogue” of these books,’ containing 1,948 pages and 23,208 articles, with a list of remainders occupying 152 pages. The issue of the catalogue at once made him famous, and secured him an unrivalled position as a second-hand bookseller; but he soon discontinued the purchase of rare and valuable works to take up the ‘remainder’ trade, which he developed with astonishing skill and for a time made