COLONIAL FL0EA8. 2(51 



taining not half the indigenous plants, and fully half of these wrongly 

 named) no work on the plants of the island had appeared, since the 

 days of Burmaim and Linnaeus, nor were there any means of study- 

 ing its Flora, except by aid of the expensive and always incomplete 

 Indian Floras, or the more voluminous general systemata of all 

 known plants. Fortunately a partially named, but incomplete, Ceylon 

 Herbarium had been formed at the Botanic Garden by Mr. Thwaites' 

 predecessors, Moon and Gardner ; this the new Director at once com- 

 menced to arrange, to increase by collecting himself and sending out 

 collectors, and to study with diligence, analysing the genera and com- 

 municating valuable papers on them to the Journal of Botany. He 

 also numbered and distributed the duplicates, sending the first set to 

 the Kew Herbarium, where they were named, and the corresponding 

 names returned to him. After eight years' labour, Mr. Thwaites com- 

 menced with these materials, his " Enumeratio," which contains the 

 names, with references to authorities, of all Singhalese plants, their lo- 

 calities, synonymy, native names and uses, notes where required, and 

 descriptions of all little known or new genera and species. The MS. 

 is sent as prepared, to Kew, and is printed and published in London. 

 The first number appeared in 1858, and the fourth, concluding the 

 Dicotyledons, is now in the press ; these are extremely carefully and 

 well done, especially considering that the author works so far from 

 the Libraries and Herbaria of Europe. It is to be hoped that it will 

 be speedily followed by a full Flora of Ceylon, on the plan of that 

 of the Cape of Good Hope, under the authority of the Home or 

 Colonial Government. 



For the Australian Continent, much has been done by Dr. F. 

 Mueller, Director of the Botanic Gardens of Victoria, an able bota- 

 nist and distinguished traveller, the companion of Gregory in his 

 famous journey across tropical N.E. Australia, and himself the ex- 

 plorer of the Victorian Alps. Dr. Mueller's works not having ap- 

 peared in a systematic form, can only be cursorily alluded to here ; 

 they consist chiefly of descriptions of new genera and species, offi- 

 cial Eeports on the botanical results of his own travels and those of 

 other travellers, and miscellaneous papers scattered through many 

 Colonial and European Journals. He has also commenced an 

 elaborate " Flora of Victoria," in quarto, with numerous plates, full 

 of analyses, executed in the Colony : of this a few sheets and plates 

 have been privately communicated, judging from which it promises 

 to be a work of great elaboration and excellence. It is much to be 

 wished that Dr. Mueller's copious writings were reduced to a syste- 

 matic form, for at present, owing to the number of periodicals (many 

 of them ephemeral or insignificant) through which they are dispersed, 

 it is impossible to consult them satisfactorily. 



Latterly a proposition has been laid by Sir "William Denison (the 

 enlightened Governor, lately of Australia, and now of Madras), before 

 the Secretary of State for the Colonies, for the publication of a series 

 of works illustrating all branches of Colonial Science — geography, 



