Introduction. xxiii 



ledge of objects of natural history, and a uniform nomenclature 

 for them." l 



As this is in no respect a strictly scientific work, but in- 

 tended mostly for unscientific flower-lovers, I have not hesitated 

 to relieve its dryness by quotations both from prose writers 

 and poets ; and I believe that, so far as these are apt and in 

 themselves good, they will be approved by those who will 

 mainly use the book. 



I may add one other point in which this work will be found 

 to differ from a scientific Flora, i.e. that I have not thought 

 it necessary to separate introduced but naturalized plants from 

 those which are truly indigenous ; but I have always, so far as 

 I know, stated the fact. I have also included such garden 

 flowers as I know under their respective orders ; but the lists 

 of these I fear will be found very imperfect, owing chiefly 

 to the time that has elapsed since I left India. 



There are, of course, a great number of the plants of 

 Western India which I have never seen. These I have de- 

 scribed altogether on the authority of Hooker, Dalzell, Graham, 

 &c. It is difficult for any one man, unless he has nothing else 

 to do, or is absolutely unfettered in his movements, to get hold 

 of every plant, even of a single district, and not many officers 

 in twenty years' service visit every part of even the smallest 

 Indian presidency. I myself have never been in the Southern 

 Maratta country at all, and my acquaintance with Guzerat is 

 decidedly limited ; and I have no doubt that more deficiencies 

 will be found in this book with reference to plants peculiar to 

 those provinces than in those of the Konkan, which I may 

 claim to know pretty well (and that, with the Ghauts, which 

 bound it on the east, is botanically the richest part of the 

 Presidency), and of the Deccan, with which I have a fair 

 acquaintance. 



I should add that all plants which I have not myself seen 

 I have marked with an asterisk. And I have added to the 

 authoritative name of each species (Hooker's), the name under 

 which it is to be found, when that is different, in Dalzell and 

 Gibson's " Bombay Flora." 



There are two or three points as to which it may seem that 

 I ought to have given more information. As to the habitat of 



1 Himalayan Journals, 524. The same vagueness is fonnd in old 

 English herbals and flower books, a few common names being 

 applied to many different plants. 



