THE FLORA OF SINGAPORE. oS 
well known Indian tree, and it is probable that the locality is 
quite wrong. 
Col. Farquhar, the first Resident of Singapore, and John 
Prince, Resident Councillor in 1827, who took a little interest in 
the botany of the island, are commemorated in the names of 
some plants, e. g. Wyristica Farquhariana, and Erycibe Prince, 
but little was done in botanical research for many years. In or 
about 1839, Hugh Cuming well known for his immense botanical 
and conchological collections in the Philippines, visited Singa- 
pore and also ascended Mount Ophir, While in the Straits he 
seems to have chiefly devoted himself to collecting orchids, and 
to have sent home a number of live ones, among which were 
Coelogyne Cuming, and Dendrobium longicolle. William Lobb, 
orchid collector for Messrs Veitch, visited Penang and Singapore 
in 1845, but as mentioned in Journal 25, p. 166, his specimens 
from the Straits Settlements, Java and India were all mixed up 
in distribution, so that his localities as quoted in books are quite 
doubtful, Surgeon-General Maingay during his residence in 
Singapore made extensive collections, but many of these again 
were irregularly labelled, and some mentioned in the Flora of 
British India as from Singapore were probably either collected 
in Malacca or Penang. 
Mr. Murton the first head of the present Botanic Gardens, 
1875 to 1880, collected a number of plants, of which a few 
were sent to Kew, and a few, chiefly ferns, are still in the Bota- 
nic Gardens Herbarium. NV. Cantley, who succeeded him, em- 
ployed collectors and obtained a very large number of speci- 
mens, but unfortunately hardly any were strictly localised, and 
many labelled from Singapore in the herbarium, are either culti- 
vated plants or from some part of the peninsula, so that in most 
cases I have been unable to quote safely from his herbarium. 
Among other collectors whose names appear in books, asso- 
ciated to a small extent with Singapore plants, should be men- 
tioned, Dr. Thomas Oxley, who wrote some papers in Logan’s 
Journal, one of which dealt with the Flora of Singapore, but 
chiefly with Economic plants, while other papers treat of Nut- 
megs and Gutta percha. He seems to have collected plants, 
saying that he had collected between 40 and 50 orchids, but 
what became of his collections and manuscripts, I cannot find 
