OF THE VEGETABLE FIBRES OF JAMAICA. 337 



MR. NATHANIEL WILSON ON THE USEFUL 



VEGETABLE PRODUCTS, ESPECIALLY THE 



FIBRES OF JAMAICA. 



We have heard rumours, but we trust they are without 

 foundation, of the want of government support to the Botanic 

 Garden in Jamaica, and that Mr. N. Wilson, its active and 

 very intelligent superintendent, has left, or is on the point of 

 leaving the colony altogether. We have ourselves had occa- 

 sion, in the great Paris Exhibition of the present year, to 

 witness the necessity of some scientific knowledge, in the 

 accurate determination of the plants which yield the various 

 vegetable substances. The Jamaica collection there deposited, 

 valuable as it is in extent, becomes tenfold more important 

 from the correct nomenclature of the objects. To say nothing 

 of the noble collections and fine specimens of the woods, &c., 

 it contains a series of fibres of the island which is more in- 

 structive than any other in the Exhibition, because of the 

 great pains that have been taken by Mr. Wilson to give the 

 scientific and vernacular names, rendering it quite clear 

 what is the exact plant which produces such and such fibre ; 

 while in other collections we find one and the same name 

 Pine-apple, aloe, Manilla hemp, &c., attached to fibres from 

 totally different (and to several kinds of) plants. Si nomina 

 pereunt, perit et cognitio rerum. Such names are worse than 

 useless they mislead. We believe the latest duties performed 

 by Mr. Wilson in the island were to draw up a report on the 

 progress and usefulness of the Botanic Garden of Bath, St. 

 Thomas the Apostle, for the past year, 1854, for the informa- 

 tion of the Honourable the Board of Directors, and to prepare 

 a full series of the fibres, &c., for the Paris Exhibition. As 

 these fibres are described in the said report, we are tempted to 

 offer the following extracts. 



" By a continuous and extensive distribution of plants from 

 Y 



