230 BOMBAY NATURAL HISTORY SOCIETY. 



Hydrophis Phipsoni. (Murray.) 

 Hydrophis Guntheri. (Murray,) 

 Hydrophis Lindsayi. (Gray.) 

 Hydrophis cliloris. (Daud.) 

 Entrydrina bengaleusis. (Gray.) 

 Pelamis bicolor. (Daud.) 



THE INDIAN HEPATIC^. 

 By Surgeon K. R. Kirtikar, I. M. D., Fellow Soc. Myc. 



(France), M. E. C. S. 

 (Read at the Society's Meeting held on hth September 1 887.> 

 On various former occasions I have brought to the notice of the 

 Society that the subject of Indian Cryptogamia, or flowerless plants, 

 has yet to be investigated; that in exhibiting before the Society, 

 from time to time, my specimens of fungi and algae growing in and 

 around Bombay, I nave failed to derive any assistance from works on 

 Indian Botany ; and this I repeat on the present occasion. This 

 fact is borne out by the independent testimony of a distinguished 

 Indian Botanist, Dr. "Wellington Gray, whose observations on the 

 Botany of the Bombay Presidency, as embodied in Vol. XXV. of the 

 Bombay Gazetteer, recently published, contains the following 

 remark: — He says," The species belonging to the indigenous flower- 

 less plants have never yet been fully described or investigated, and 

 there are doubtless multitudes of new species still to be discovered. 

 And this is literally true. Take up any book on Indian Botany, — 

 Professor Oliver's " Indian Botany," for instance. Considering 

 that Professor. Oliver has never visited India, and that the book 

 written is from dried Herbaria, and from species of Indian plants 

 growing in England — in the Kew Gardens — the work is admir- 

 able. In that book containing nearly four hundred pages, however 

 the Cryptogams are disposed of in twenty pages. No mention is 

 made of the order Hepaticre, specimens of which are exhibited this 

 evening. In Gregg's text-book of Indian Botany, recently prepared 

 for the Hooghly College in Bengal, a merely passing allusion is made 

 to the order Hepaticaa. In Boxburgh's "Indian Flora," recently edited 

 by Mr. Clai-ke, there is a chapter added on the miscellaneous Cryp- 

 togamia. No mention is made of the Hepaticao. Now, I do not 

 mention all this to show the magnitude of the result of my researches 

 in that neglected branch of Botany, but rather the magnitude of the 

 difficulties I have had in investigating the subject. I have to depend 

 on my own resources entirely. Considering that one is accustomed to 



