( 87 ) 



tain a similar knowledge of the quality and natural requirements of other tropica! trees in 

 America (more especially in Brazil, Central America, and Mexico), and also of those in Aus- 

 tralia and tropical Africa, a field of no little importance would be opened up. We should then 

 be enabled to select the most valuable and suitable timber trees for our plantations, and stock 

 desert tracts of India with such dry country trees as may be most suitable for them. 



The more direct information which a forester would derive from such a system hardly 

 requires explanation. A forest herbarium containing specimens of woody and other useful 

 plants is indispensable to a forester in India, because he is placed under very different circum- 

 stances to a European forester (and in the liigher grades, foresters in Europe are highly 

 scientific men). A European forester has to deal at the outside with 400 species of woody plauts, 

 amongst which such ambiguous creeping things are included as Salix herhacca, etc., plants 

 which an Indian forester would hardly ever accept as woody plants. But of these 400 species, 

 barely 200 come within his direct observation, and besides this, his work is made easy by the 

 numerous publications relating to these subjects. 



The total number of woody plants in India (such at least as deserve the name of shrub) 

 is hardly below from 7000 to 8000 species, and selecting from these such as may strictly be 

 classed among trees, there still remain about 4000 (or I dare say 5000) species. A knowledge 

 of these alone would stamp a forester as a systematic botanist of some reputation. Let us turn 

 now to the local forest officer, such as a Conservator of a province in India should be ; how many 

 species of woody plants has he before him ? If we exclude N. W. India, the desert tracts and 

 alluvial plains, I do not think there is a province in which a forest officer has not to deal with 

 about 800 species of trees and possibly 1000 of other woody plants, climbers as well as shrubs. 

 Need I repeat that an Indian forester has a task before him, to properly master which he 

 necessarily requires a very large amount of botanical knowledge ? To these difficulties is added 

 the necessity of working in any (even the rudest) botanical research with the knife and 

 magnifier, without which he could not get on satisfactorily with his work. 



It would possibly be a much better plan, if some of the foresters who shew themselves 

 interested in, and competent to undertake practical botanical researches, were allowed to devote 

 their time exclusively to this and related branches of forestry ; and tlieir work would be greatly 

 simplified if each of them were placed over the respective botanical regions indicated in the 

 first part of this report (p. 21) and without reference to political divisions. Thus there would 

 be required only 3 or 4 botanical foresters, say one each for Hindustan, the Himalayas, the 

 Khasya hills and eastern Bengal, and Burma (possibly including Malacca).* The operations 

 connected with timber-plantations would profit greatly under the direction of these Officers, 

 whose field-experience would be guided by scientific principles, and many violations of the 

 most simple natural laws would thus be prevented ; while the strictly practical forester would 

 have his time reserved for the execution of his more direct duties. 



B. Auxiliary Brakch. 



1. Climatology. \ 



I would have passed over this subject altogether, as one generally understood, had it not 

 occurred to me that our knowledge of the climatology of mauy parts of India is still very imper- 

 fect, and in no way equal to the requirements of forestry and of the acclimatization of plants 

 generally. Tlie outlines given here are only general with special reference to forest operations 

 in tropical India. 



To obtain a clear insight into the climatology of a country with reference to its vegetation, 

 it is not absolutely necessary to liave such elaborate meteorological tables as are usually kept 

 at observatories. There are, however, two extremes, where more careful details are imperative, 

 viz. in those countries and elevations, where the temperature reaches freezing point, and again 

 where excessive heat and dryness are so great as to prove highly injurious to vegetable growth. 

 Tropical plants cannot endure such a great degree of temperature within certain ex- 

 tremes, like temperate plants, and, as a rule, the slightest change in the hygrometrical state of 

 the atmosphere affects them greatly. This explaius why many tropical trees of low lands, if 

 shade-loving hygrocliinatics, may ascend into damp regions of considerable elevation, while 

 tropical xeroclimatics do so in a lesser degree, for instance, iu the Tibetan high lauds ; a crossing 

 of the two conditions would, in most cases, imply certain death to both. Such considerations 

 are of importance in the acclimatization of plants. It would be a great mistake, for instance, to 

 try to plant an apple tree or a vine in a damp climate, even if the elevation gives a temper- 

 ature correspondiug with that of the natural habitat of the tree. 



* The plains and other poor or desert districts, like Scinde, Tibefr, etc., do not require the services of special 

 botanical foresters, but might be attached to the adjoining botanical regions. 



t An excellent essay on Indian climate will be found in Drs. Hooker and Thomson's introduction to their 

 Flora Jndiea p. 74, et sqq. For elementary education either Sir J. Herschel's Meteorology, or Thompson's 

 Introduction to Meteorology may be used. 



