Making hay when the sun don't shine: the Rev. William Richardson, science and society in early nineteenth-century Ireland.

The article discusses Irish Protestant minister and amateur botanist William Richardson, focusing on his work with a grass called fiorin, also known as fiorthann or Agrostis stolonifera. It examines Richardson within the scientific and intellectual context of the early nineteenth century, commenting on the Enlightenment. The author particularly reflects on intellectual societies and the intellectual world of Belfast, Northern Ireland. Belfast Literary Society founder William Bruce is also considered.