88 THE JOURNAL OF BOTANY 



India, which, tliough identified with other names, hut for him wouhl 

 never have attained success. He w^as one of the makers of New 

 Eomha}', and he left an imperishable impress on the city, where his 

 birthday was annually observed with rejoicing and his bust in the 

 University Senate Hall regarded as a shrine." 



Born at Belgaum, Bombay, on December 8, 1832, George Bird- 

 wood, at the age of seven, came to England with his father. General 

 Christopher Birdwood, and was placed at school : in due course he 

 went to Edinburgh University, where he graduated M.D. in 1854. 

 Here he became class assistant to John Hvitton Balfour : 



" It is no doubt due in large measure to my training under Professor 

 Balfour" he informed an interviewer for the Morning Post (Dec. 11, 

 1911) " that botany has always been a favourite study of mine. More 

 particularly I have interested myself in commercial vegetable products 

 of Biblical and classical interest. The researches of scholars have been 

 so extensive that there is little now that is not known with regard to 

 the different kinds of flora mentioned in the Bible. I was, however, 

 so fortunate as to identify for the first time the frankincense plant. 

 For many centuries incense had been in use in Christian churches, 

 yet, botanically speaking, it was unknown. It was collected by 

 wild tribes somewhere in Arabia or Somaliland and despatched to 

 Europe l)y exporters. Fortunately I had a friend in the late Lord 

 Playfair's brother, who was British llesident at Aden, and I told him 

 where I thought the plant might be found. He sent men out into South 

 Arabia and the Somali countr}^, and eventually he brought me speci- 

 mens which proved beyond question to be what I had been seeking. 

 My paper describing the plant was in the form of a lecture at tlie 

 Linnsean Society, and it was published in that Society's Transactions." 



This paper (Trans. Linn. Soc. xxvii. 111-148: 1870), in which 

 three new species of Bosioellia are described, is an excellent piece of 

 work, containing as it does a history of olibanum or frankincense 

 from tlie earliest period down to the time of writing Avith references 

 to the literature of the subject. The position of the Arabian thuri- 

 ferous region had already been fixed by Henry John Carter (1813-95), 

 of the Bombay Medical Service, who had published a paper on 

 " the Frankincense tree of Arabia " (Journ. Bombay R. Asiat. Soe. 

 ii. 380 : 1847) which he identified with B. thurifera, but which 

 Birdwood described as new, naming it after him B. Carterii. This 

 paper was reprinted as an appendix to M. C. Cooke's Beport on the 

 Oums, etc. of the India Museum (1874) : another paper on the same 

 subject was contributed to the Pharmaceutical Journal for 1871. 



In 1854 Birdwood was appointed to the Bombay Medical Staff ; 

 here he filled the offices of Secretaiy and Cvu-ator of the Government 

 Central Museum, Professor of Materia Medica at Grant's College, and 

 Secretary to the Agricultural and Horticultural Society of Western 

 India. In connection with the Museum he published (18G2) a, 

 Catalogue of the Bconomic Products of the Presidency — a full and 

 careful compilation from the best authorities, with notes exhibiting 

 considerable knowledge and research into the early history of some of 

 the plants enumerated. Such knowledge characterized all his com- 

 munications, especially those relating to India : of these a selection was 



