THE AGRICULTURAL SOCIETY OF INDIA. 187 
Mr. Hance describes also a new Mint cultivated by the Chinese of 
Hongkong in their gardens. He gives it the name of M. reticulata, 
but from his description it is most probably some garden variety of the 
M. viridis. 
(To be continued.) 
— —— 
A Brief Notice concerning the Agricultural and Horticultural Society of 
India*; by Dr. N. Wauxicn, V.P. Royal and Linn. Soc. 
The Agricultural and Horticultural Society of India is, next to the 
celebrated Asiatic Society of Bengal, the most known, and certainly the 
most popular among the scientific and practical institutions in British 
India. In numbers of members it exceeds them all. It was esta- 
blished at Calcutta on the 14th September, 1820, by the late Rev. Dr. 
William Carey, one of the most extraordinary men who ever came to 
India, both as a Missionary, a profound oriental scholar and author, and 
a botanist and agriculturist. In the prospectus which that pious and 
good man had printed and circulated five months previously, and to 
which he afterwards added a list of desiderata, the urgent necessity of 
such an institution being formed in a country where immemorial 
customs and habits had for ages past stood in the way of amelioration 
and progress in the arts of civilized life, were briefly but forcibly set 
forth. The successful labours of the Society during its thirty-two years 
of existence, and .of the many branch societies which have emanated — 
from it in different parts of India, amply attest the wisdom and sound- 
ness of the founder’s views. Year after year has this flourishing insti- 
tution been improving and enlarging its sphere of activity, until it has 
at present attained a position of much importance and influence, and — 
become a real blessing to the country. No wonder, therefore, that it — 
enjoys the substantial support and patronage of the Government of India - 
as well as the Court of Directors at home, evinced by annual pecuniary — 
grants, and by frequent and large donations of agricultural and other - 
seeds, and communications of papers possessing public interest, either 
* We do not yet know so much in Europe as we ought to know of the Individuals 
and Societies which have furthered the cause of the departments of science alluded to 
in the heading of this article. We are furnished by our invaluable friend Dr. Wallich 
with a notice respecting one of the most extensively 
trust this will be followed by some others.—Ep. 
VOL. V. 
T 
useful of these societies, and we ; z Pd 
