DESIDERATA 
FROM 
BOTANICAL COLLECTORS IN WESTERN TROPICAL AFRICA. 
i 
A First glance at the Flora Nigritiana will show how very 
imperfect our acquaintance yet remains, notonly with the luxu- 
riant wild vegetation of West Tropical Africa, including the 
herbs or trees which furnish many of its most valuable pro- 
ducts, but even with many of the plants in general cultivation 
there. This circumstance may in a great measure be ascribed 
to the want of any of those permanent botanical establishments 
which have afforded us so much useful information on the 
vegetation of the East and West Indies, and have been the 
means of effecting so many valuable exchanges of plants res- 
pectively cultivated in the two hemispheres. Tropical Africa 
has never even had a resident botanist, and all our knowledge 
on the subject has been derived from travellers who have either 
perished there before their mission has been completed, or 
have hastened home to avoid the effects of the deadly climate. 
Much is therefore now to be done by a collector who will 
carefully note down any authentie particulars he can learn, 
and any observations that occur to him, relating to the plants 
of which he preserves specimens. 
Such information will always be the more valuable the 
more cautiously it is collected, avoiding as much as possible 
mere hearsay information, and noting down in all cases the 
sources whence it is derived. It is also important that the 
memoranda should be on labels attached to the dried specimens, 
to avoid the numerous mistakes arising from the mismatching 
memoranda and their specimens by the time they reach the hands 
