ii INTRODUCTION. 



the office of the Conservator of Forests in Bengal at Darjeeling, and 

 it is these two collections, and especially the former, which have been 

 chiefly used and consulted in the preparation of this work. But it is 

 necessary here to point out, that the collections prepared in 1877-78 

 from the contributions to the Paris Exhibition works, would not alone 

 have sufficed for the description of anything like the number of species 

 which find a place herein, and it was owing to the fortunate circum- 

 stance that the large private collection of Dr. Brandis was available 

 that it was found possible to make sure of the identification of most of 

 the more ordinary timbers and lay the foundation for the descriptions 

 which are now published. When it is considered that Dr. Brandis' 

 private collection gave no less than 320 specimens, and that the private 

 collection personally formed by the writer in the Darjeeling forests, 

 and that of Burmese and Andaman woods made by the late Mr. S. 

 Kurz and presented by the Superintendent of the Royal Botanical 

 Gardens, Calcutta, gave a further series of 194 specimens, it will be 

 understood that considerable material was available to add to the nucleus 

 formed by the Paris Exhibition sets. But this is not all, for, by the 

 kindness of several Forest Officers, supplementary pieces were received, 

 sometimes spontaneously, sometimes by special request, from time to 

 time ; and there have been, even since the work itself was completely 

 printed, several important additions. These were chiefly obtained by the 

 writer's personal collection in various parts of Bengal, such as Darjeeling, 

 the Western Duars, Chittagong, Chota Nagpore, and Orissa, and have 

 been described, if not in the pages of the work, at any rate in the 

 rather voluminous Adddenda-Corrigenda sheets. In order to explain 

 more definitely the sources from which the original Paris Exhibition 

 woods were obtained, the following extract from Dr. Brandis' Intro- 

 duction to the Catalogue of specimens of forest produce sent to that 

 Exhibition will be worth quoting : 



" The orders for the preparation of the present collection were received in August 

 1877 ; and, as it was necessary to despatch it early in February 1878, so as to be in 

 time for the Exhibition, barely six months were available to bring together specimens 

 from all parts of India, and to prepare and name them. The work was entrusted io 

 the undersigned and to Mr. J. S. Gamble, Assistant Conservator of Forests, who un- 

 dertook the task of supervising the preparation of the specimens. A workshop was at 

 once established in Simla, and a large number of pieces were collected from the hills 

 in the vicinity of that place. These sporini'-ns are numbered from 1 to 115, ami from 

 145 to 159. Early in November the work was transferred to Calcutta, where the 

 specimens from all provinces were collected. 



"The bulk of the logs and pieces from which the specimens were prepared arrival 

 in December and January; some, however, were not received until February, after the 

 collection had been prepared, packed, and despatched. It thus happens that u largo 



