‘Angel in the house’ is an idealized icon of Victorian women, who unconditionally loved, supported and submitted to their husbands. Borrowing this metaphor, I discuss three kinds of angels in colonial botany, which was intrinsically patriarchal. The first consists of metropolitan women, who never travelled, but celebrated and consumed trophies of colonial botany in their domestic life in Europe, such as planting exotics in backyards, cooking foreign diets in kitchens, reading botanical and travel literature, collecting foreign specimens in cabinets and sponsoring naturalists. The second covers elegant botanical wives in colonies, accomplished in domestic responsibilities while engaging in botany as polite learning. The third is made up of voyaging botanical women, exempted from domestic responsibilities and completely devoted to botany. These angels often corresponded with elite botanists, botanized under their instruction and made contributions to botanical science. All three categories endorsed the agenda of imperialism and their study of botany was facilitated by its power.

“家中的天使”是维多利亚时代女性的理想化偶像，她们无条件地爱、支持和服从丈夫。借用这个比喻，我讨论了殖民植物学中的三种天使，它们本质上是父权制的。第一个是都市女性，她们从未旅行过，但在欧洲的家庭生活中庆祝和消费殖民植物学的奖杯，例如在后院种植外来植物、在厨房烹饪外国饮食、阅读植物学和旅行文学、在橱柜中收集外国标本并赞助博物学家。第二个涵盖了殖民地中优雅的植物妻子，完成了家庭责任，同时从事植物学作为礼貌学习。第三个是由远航植物学女性组成，免除家庭责任，完全致力于植物学。这些天使经常与精英植物学家通信，在他们的指导下进行植物学研究并为植物科学做出贡献。这三类人都赞同帝国主义的议程，他们对植物学的研究也得益于帝国主义的力量。