UE 
BOTANICAL INFORMATION, 183 
AFRICAN Oak (or. TEAK). 
Tas. VI. 
As in India the most celebrated tree for ship-building (Tectona 
grandis) is called Teak, or Indian Oak, so a timber of the West Coast 
of Tropical Africa, long known for its qualities in naval architecture, 
and long and largely imported into this country, goes commonly 
by the name of African Teak or African Oak. But, notwithstanding 
the extensive use made of this tree, and our familiarity with its wood, 
the botanical characters have been (and still are, in a measure) hidden | 
from us. Our ignorance has not, however, arisen from indifference, or a 
want of inquiry; for years past, many individuals, and none more than 
our valued friend Sir William Symonds, late Surveyor-General of 
the Navy, have been diligent in endeavouring to obtain, and tra- 
vellers and merchants have sought, the needful information ; but from 
the fact of the trees being felled far in the interior, and the persons 
engaged in the operation being ignorant natives, no information that 
could be depended upon was obtained. Various specimens of foliage, 
indeed, had been sent to ourselves and others as the African Teak; and ` 
this very circumstance showed that they had been carelessly gathered, 
and that we possessed no clue to the right kind. Dr. Vogel’s attention, 
during Captain Trotter’s late ‘ Expedition to Explore the Niger,’ was 
directed to the subject; yet even he, anxious as he must have been to 
prosecute the needful inquiries, was only able to obtain a single leaf 
(no flowers or fruit), brought down by a native from the River Sann, 
to Captain Trotter, as the * African Oak,” or “ Teak." “So that,” 
continues Mr. Bentham, in ‘ Niger Flora,’ p. 487, “ the wood, long em- - de 
ployed in our navy under the name of African Oak, or African Teak, 
is a remarkable instance of a highly valuable and most extensively-used 
timber, of which the tree that supplies it is wholly unknown to science. 
Botanieal collectors have frequently made it the object of their 
researches and inquiries ; but, on the one hand, no botanist appears to 
have actually visited the forests which furnish it; and, on the other, 
the natives who have brought leaves as from the trees, either by 
ignorance or carelessness, or more probably from ill-judged interested 
motives, have evidently, in most cases, deceived us. Thus, we have - 
heard that among various leaves presented to Mr. Brown, as found 
