2 INTRODUCTION. 



kind, or choked up in the midst of different kinds of jungul- 

 trees. 



There are in the country, it is true, gardens in possession of 

 the wealthier natives, where fruit-trees of choice kinds are to 

 be found, and where some slight attention is bestowed upon 

 them, but such gardens are comparatively very few ; and even 

 in gardens such as these, of the vegetable productions that 

 belong to the country, there are none that possess any high 

 merit but what has been at some time owing to a mere sport of 

 nature, wholly unaided by the hand of man. Cultivation to the 

 extent of pruning and manuring undoubtedly is practised, but 

 anything like a careful and persevering endeavour to surpass 

 in any instance what has already been done before, seems never 

 to be contemplated. By many even the simple operation of 

 budding is regarded with superstitious aversion ; and as for the 

 methods of hybridizing, crossing, or the more easy one of 

 "repeated selection," whereby cultivators in Europe are con- 

 tinually raising vegetables, fruits, and flowers, of a better 

 description, any such proceeding is altogether unknown. 



Nor of Europeans, moreover, can it be affirmed during the 

 long time they have been resident in India, that they have 

 done much, save in the introduction of new plants, towards the 

 advancement of horticulture. The mere ordinary operations 

 of working the soil, watering, highly manuring, pruning, and 

 inarching are all that has been done ; no efforts have been 

 made to improve the races of plants indigenous to the country ; 

 no attempt by any of the more refined processes of science to 

 produce superior varieties. It has been stated that the fine 

 varieties of Mango, for which one locality at Bombay is famous, 

 have resulted from the skill bestowed upon their culture by 

 the Europeans who first settled in that part of India an 

 assertion that rests upon very slender foundations ; and this is 

 the only instance, I believe, where it is even pretended that an 

 improved variety of fruit has been produced in India, by the 

 art of the cultivator. 



At the Government Botanical Gardens at Seebpore, near 

 Calcutta, for a period of very many years, there has been a 

 constant accession of plants of every description, brought from 

 all reigons of the world, as well as from every part of India. 

 From this establishment plants and seeds were formerly dis- 

 tributed gratuitously to all who applied for them. This was 

 not only a very great boon to the individual applicants, but a 



