PBOCEEDINGS OF THE 



with a strong frame and a constitution tliat never failed him, and 

 which sickness never touched, he toiled on, from first to last, the 

 earnest and ardent investigator of every natural object that came 

 within his reach. One incident, connected with Dr. Eoyle's service 

 in India, redounds so highly to his scientific credit that it appears 

 deserving of an honoured record. The first Burmese and other wars 

 had brought the finances of India to an unusually disastrous state ; 

 and the home authorities devolved upon the Grovernor- General, 

 Lord "William Bentinck, the ungrateful task of retrieving the un- 

 toward position by unpopular measures. Eetrenchment the most 

 ruthless was applied to every department of the public service that 

 would admit of the process. The medical branch suffered most, 

 and was struck down at one blow from affluent ease to com- 

 parative indigence. Dr. Eoyle, in his medical relations, suffered 

 equally with the rest of his brethren ; but the Botanical Garden at 

 Saharunpore was for the time spared, as an outlying exception. 

 At last the Govenor- General visited the station with the announced 

 intention of abolishing the Botanical Garden. It was remote and 

 unfrequented, and therefore doomed. Dr. Eoyle, dissatisfied with 

 the turn which the service had taken, was on the eve of vacating 

 his appointment, on promotion to a higher grade, and returning 

 to Europe to resign the service. Yet so good a show did he make 

 of sterling, honest, and useful work, and of practical results effected 

 by the Botanic Garden, that the Governor- General, finding at the 

 same time that it was supported by a native endowment, was 

 compelled to abandon the threatened decree for the abolition of 

 the institution, and the Saharunpore Garden was saved. For this 

 service Dr. Eoyle is entitled to the enduring gratitude of all Indian 

 naturalists. In 1831 he returned to Europe with a large and valu- 

 able collection of materials. With characteristic energy he threw 

 himself at once upon the investigation of what he had amassed, 

 and between that period and 1840 he devoted himself chiefly to 

 the publication of his great work, the " Illustrations of the Botany 

 and other branches of the Natural History of the Himalaya 

 Mountains," which is distinguished alike by a very large amount 

 of original information, and by the most comprehensive, exact, 

 and useful research. He became a member of all the leading 

 scientific societies of the Metropolis His election as aEeUow of 

 the Linnean Society dates from 1833 ; and in the same year he 

 read a Paper " On the Lycium of Dioscorides," which is printed 

 in the 17th volvime of our ' Transactions.' Abovit the same time 

 he received from the University of Munich the diploma of a 



