14 
Mr. T. PETCH, B.A., B.Sc., has been appointed by the Secretary 
of State for the Colonies, on the recommendation of Kew 
Government Mycologist for Ceylon. 
Gallery for a. —Some considerable rearrangements 
have been made in the Museums at the Royal Botanic Gardens, 
Kew. A new aller, 130 feet long by 16 feet wide, at the back 
of Museum No. IIL, was opened on February Ist. ‘lo this the 
entire collection of Sarat aa (Conifers, Cycads and Gnetacee, 
including Welwitschia) has been transferred. The space in 
Museum No, I. thus set free has been utilised in making a more 
poe We display of its contents, which had become very much 
wded. 
‘De well-lighted wall-space in the new gallery has enabled the 
collection of maps and plans of the establishment at various 
periods to be brought together. Several of these have been 
contributed by H.M. the “late Queen and by H.M.’s Office of 
orks and are of considerable historical interest. A set of the 
fine photographs of Kew in its various aspects, which were sent 
y the Government to the Paris Exhibition of 1900, are also shown, 
as fear as an extensive series of photographs of coniferous trees in 
their ave countries, 
ng Tree.—In the Kew Bulletin for 1896 (p. 156), 
particulars are given of this remarkable tree, which is Ieoressited 
in the North Gallery of Paintings, No. 530. The Timber Museum 
now poner a fine section of the wood presented by His Majesty 
the King. It is cut from a buttress and measures 10 feet 6 inches 
by 9 feet 3inches. The tapang, tapan, or tappan, as it is variously 
spelt, ee excelsa, Taubert (Abauria excelsa, Beccari) was 
first described by Dr. O. Beccari, who states that it is probably the 
tallest tree in Borneo, attaining a height of 70 to 80 metres, 
60 feet. The cylindrical part of the trunk is not propor- 
tionately arses but it is supported by very wide, flat buttresses, 
and Dr. Beccari gives the outside girth of a tree as nearly 70 feet. 
This slab wai presented by Rajah Brooke to Admiral Sir Henry 
Keppel, who brought it to this country about forty years ago. It 
is a radial section through one of the buttresses. 
e Bulletin referred to above there is a mistake. Th 
‘mensions of the pod are those of the Ku umpas, Koompassia 
malaccensis, not of the tapang, of which the pod is still unknown. 
Research in Jodrell Laboratory in 1904 :— 
Boodle, L. A.—Succulent Leaves in the Wallflower (Chetranthus 
oa ay (New Phytologist, Vol. IIL, pp. 39-46, Fig. in text.) 
e, L. a Tracheides in Psilotum. (New Phyto- 
logist, iat Vol IIL., pp. 48 and 49.) 
