"JOHN" ROXBURGH 31 



contains tlie passage : — " I congratulate you on William's appoint- 

 ment. Although it certainly would have been better to have got 

 him a Writer, yet the garden will be a handsome provision for him, 

 and with the opportunities he will have under your tuition he will 

 soon become a proficient." It seems clear from this letter that 

 Buchanan believed that William's appointment carried with it, if 

 not the right, at all events the prospect of succeeding his father. 



A youth of great energy and much promise, William Roxburgh, 

 junior, at once entered on a career of active botanical exploration. 

 He spent a considerable portion of the year 1800 at Avork in the 

 Rajmahal Hills (Flora Indica, vol. ii. p. 51). When Buchanan, 

 who was a personal friend and correspondent of the younger man as 

 well as of his father, became aware of this, he at once expressed his 

 disappointment. '* I am very sorry," he remarks to Dr. Roxburgh 

 in a letter from Mysore, dated 31 January, 1801, "that William has 

 gone to the Rajmahal hills. If possible, send him to Chittagong — 

 an immense held remains there, by far the best I have seen in India." 

 Roxburgh followed Buchanan's advice ; during 1801 William was at 

 work in Chittagong (Flora Indica, vol. i. p. 81). By the time that 

 William returned Buchanan had completed his Mysore survey and 

 had joined the embassy led by Captain Knox into Nepal during 

 1801-2. Roxburgh endeavoured to secure William's attachment to 

 this embassy and on 22 February, 1802, wrote to Buchanan explaining 

 his wishes. Replying from the Nepal frontier on 2 March, 1802, 

 Buchanan said " I shall be very happ}^ if you succeed in sending 

 William : but I am affraid you will not meet with success in the 

 application to Government for the purpose." Buchanan had, in fact, 

 discussed the proposal with Captain Knox, who explained to him 

 that the Nepal Durbar had already objected to the number of 

 English officers attached to the Embassy. The anticipation was 

 correct ; Grovernment did not permit William to cross the Nepal 

 frontier. The dated entries in the Hortus Bengalensis show that 

 William was still in Chittagong at the beginning of 1802 and that 

 he collected in Bengal on his return journey, probably in the 

 Sundribuns. When he reached Calcutta his father appears to have 

 arranged that William should proceed to Penang, and although none 

 of the Penang collections alluded to in the Flora Indica are dated, 

 all the dated ones in the Hortus Bengalensis were secured in 1802. 

 After having investigated Penang we find from the Hortus Ben- 

 galensis (pp. 1, 11) that William visited the Moluccas, returning 

 thence to Sumatra, where he was employed during 1803 (Flora 

 Indica, vol. i. p. 70; Hort. Beng. pp. 1, 63, 65, 69) and 1804 

 (Flora Indica, vol. iii. p. 457 ; Hort. Beng. pp. 43, 69). In the 

 following year William was once more at the Botanic Garden with 

 his father; for the solitary name, Flemingia prostrata, which 

 Roxburgh has attributed to his son, was bestowed by the latter on 

 a plant "raised from, seed sent by Mr. Kerr from China to the 

 Botanic Garden in 1805, where they blossom about the close of 

 the rains in November and ripen their seed during the cool season." 

 This indirect reference is the last we can find to William Roxburgh, 

 junior, and the suggestion that William died soon after the cold 



