ROBERT WIGHT. 1 



Robert Wight, M. D., died at his residence, near Read- 

 ing, England, May 26, 1872, at the age of seventy-six years. 

 He was born in East Lothian, Scotland, educated at the Edin- 

 burgh High School, and professionally at Edinburgh Univer- 

 sity, where he took his medical degree in 1816. He went to 

 India, the field of his botanical career and most useful ad- 

 ministrative activity for forty years, in 1819. He was first 

 assistant surgeon and afterward full surgeon of a native regi- 

 ment in the East India Company's service, but was soon trans- 

 ferred to the charge of tjie Botanic Garden at Madras, and 

 finally to that of the important cotton plantations at Coimba- 

 toor. His earliest botanical contributions occupy a conspicu- 

 ous place in Hooker's " Botanical Miscellany," commencing 

 in 1830, and in the continuation of that work under other 

 names and firms. In 1834, after a temporary sojourn in his 

 native city, appeared the first volume of a model flora, the 

 " Prodromus Flora} Peninsular India} Orientalis," by Dr. 

 Wight and Mr. (afterwards Professor) Arnott, of which their 

 successors in the field remarked, that it is the most able and 

 valuable contribution to Indian botany which has ever ap- 

 peared, and one which has few rivals in the whole domain of 

 botanical literature. Dr. Wight returned to India immedi- 

 ately after the publication of this initial volume of the work, 

 which was never continued. In India, assisted by native ar- 

 tists whom he had trained, he brought out two quarto volumes 

 of " Illustrations of Indian Botany," with one hundred and 

 eighty-two colored plates ; his " Spicilegium Nielgherrense," 

 of similar character ; and finally his " Icones Plantarum India} 

 Orientalis," in six volumes, with 2101 uncolored lithographic 

 plates, and elaborate analysis, of unequal merit, many of them 

 1 American Journal of Science and Arts, 3 ser., v. 395. (1873.) 



