OcToBER 12, 1899] 
The average speed is about 18 kilometres per hour with a train 
of fifty-five tons. Besides the locomotives, automobile carriages 
equipped up to 240-horse power are provided for the greater 
part of the passenger traffic, and these trains run at 36 kilo- 
metres per hour. Nothing could have been smoother or more 
satisfactory than the way in which the train (hauled in this case 
by one locomotive) was stopped and started, and it got up its 
speed with satisfactory quickness. It may be safely predicted 
that though this is the first railway of the type (as distinguished 
from a tramway) it will not be the last, for the transmission of 
current at 16,000 volts does not demand wires of more than two 
millimetres diameter for the distances mentioned. No difficulty 
seems to be experienced in insulation. Ordinary insulators of 
the double petticoat type without oil are employed, and no 
special precautions are taken with regard to the posts on which 
these wires are supported except to inscribe upon them a 
genial warning as to the fate likely to befall anybody meddling 
with them. 
The railway up the Jungfrau is also a very interesting work, 
and an excellent day was spent in a visit to it. It goes up to 
the Rothstock a long way above the Wengern Alp, and there it 
ends at presentin a tunnel. It happened that while some of the 
party were standing close to the locomotive in the tunnel the 
line was struck by lightning, the fuses blown in the power 
station, and the automatic break on the locomotive instantly 
went into action, though the train was at rest. From the 
electrical point of view, there was not much to be seen on the 
Jungfrau Railway, but we had splendid weather, and regarded 
the trip as a day’s holiday. 
On the whole we may, perhaps, say that we saw more, but 
not better, electrical work than can be done in England. We 
saw that Swiss engineers have the courage of their convictions, 
and have done more in railway work than most of us had ever 
dreamed of ; and we saw that, as regards the carbide and similar 
industries, we cannot hope to compete in England till we can 
get at something cheaper than steam power. On the other 
hand, English industries in general cannot be regarded as 
threatened by Swiss enterprise ; and Switzerland itself, regarded 
as a manufacturing country, requires (as Mr. Raworth remarked) 
to be rolled and to have its lakes filled up. 
RICHARD THRELFALL, 
THE BRITISH ASSOCIATION. 
SECTION K. 
BOTANY. 
OPENING ADDRESS BY SiR GEORGE KING, K.C.LE., LL.D., 
F.R.S., PRESIDENT OF THE SECTION, 
A Shetch of the History of Indian Botany. 
THE earliest references in literature to Indian plants are, of 
course, those which occur in the Sanskrit classics. These are, 
however, for the most part vague and obscure. The interest 
which these references have, great as it may be, is not 
scientific, and they may therefore be omitted from consider- 
ation on the present occasion. The Portuguese, who were the 
first Europeans to appear in India as conquerors and settlers, 
did practically nothing in the way of describing the plants 
of their Eastern possessions. And the first contribution to the 
knowledge of the botany of what is now British India was 
made by the Dutch in the shape of the ‘‘ Hortus Malabaricus,” 
which was undertaken at the instance of Van Rheede, Governor 
of the territory of Malabar, which during the latter half of the 
seventeenth century had become a possession of Holland. This 
book, which is in twelve folio volumes and is illustrated by 794 
plates, was published at Amsterdam between the years 1686 and 
1703, under the editorship of the distinguished botanist Com- 
melyn. Van Rheede was himself only a botanical amateur, but 
he had a great love of plants and most enlightened ideas as to 
the value of a correct and scientific knowledge of them. The 
“ Hortus Malabaricus’’ was based on specimens collected by 
Brahmins, on drawings of many of the species made by 
Mathzeus, a Carmelite missionary at Cochin, and on descriptions 
originally drawn up in the vernacular language of Malabar, 
which were afterwards translated into Portuguese by Corneiro, a 
Portuguese official in Cochin, and from that language finally 
done into Latin by Van Douet. The whole of these operations 
were carried on under the general superintendence of Casearius, 
NO. 1563, VOL. 60] 
NATURE 
581 
a missionary at Cochin. Of this most interesting work the 
plates are the best part ; in fact, some of these are so good that 
there is no difficulty in identifying them with the species which 
they are intended to represent. The next important contribution 
to the botanical literature of Tropical Asia deals rather with 
the plants of Dutch than of British India. It was the work 
of George Everhard Rumph (a native of Hanover), a physician 
and merchant, who for some time was Dutch Consul at Amboina. 
The materials for this book were collected mainly by Rumphius 
himself, and the Latin descriptions and the drawings (of 
which there are over one thousand) were his own work. 
The book was printed in 1690, but it remained unpublished 
during the author’s lifetime. umph died at Amboina in 
1706, and his manuscript, after lying for thirty years in the 
hands of the Dutch East India Company, was rescued from 
oblivion by Prof. John Burman, of Amsterdam (commonly 
known as the elder Burman), and was published under the title 
of ‘* Herbarium Amboinense,” in seven folio volumes, between 
the years 1741 and 1755. The illustrations of this work cover 
over a thousand species, but they are printed on 696 plates. 
These illustrations are as much inferior to those of Van Rheede’s 
book as the descriptions are superior to those of the latter The 
works of Plukenet, published in London between 1696 and 
1705, in quarto, contain figures of a number of Indian plants 
which, although small in size, are generally good portraits, and 
therefore deserve mention in an enumeration of botanical books 
connected with British India. An account of the plants of 
Ceylon, under the name ‘‘ Thesaurus Zeylanicus,” was pub- 
lished in 1737 by John Burman (the elder Burman), and in this 
work many of the plants which are common to that island anil 
to Peninsular India are described. Burman’s book was founded 
on the collections of Paul Hermann, who spent seven years 
(from 1670 to 1677) exploring the flora of Ceylon at the expense 
of the Dutch East India Company. The nomenclature of the 
five books already mentioned is all uninominal. 
Hermann’s Cingalese collection fell, however, sixty years 
after the publication of Burman’s account of it, into the hands 
of Linnzeus, and that great systematist published in 1747 an 
account of such of the species as were adequately represented 
by specimens, under the title ‘‘ Flora Zeylanica.” This Her- 
mann herbarium, consisting of 600 species, may still be con- 
sulted at the British Museum, by the Trustees of which institu- 
tion it was acquired, along with many of the other treasures 
possessed by Sir Joseph Banks. Linnzeus’s ‘‘ Flora Zeylanica”’ 
was followed in 1768 by the ‘‘ Flora Indica” of Nicholas Bur- 
man (the younger Burman)—an inferior production, in which 
about 1500 species are described. The herbarium on which this 
“*Flora Indica” was founded now forms part of the great 
Herbarium Delessert at Geneva, 
The active study of botany on the binominal system of nomen- 
clature invented by Linnzeus was initiated in India itself by 
Koenig, a pupil of that great reformer and systematist. It will 
be convenient to divide the subsequent history of botanic science 
in India into two periods, the first extending from Koenig's 
arrival in India in 1768, to that of Sir Joseph Hooker's arrival 
in 1849; and the second from the latter date to the present day. 
The pioneer John Gerard Koenig was a native of the Baltic 
province of Courland. He was a correspondent of Linnzus, 
whose pupil he had formerly been. Koenig went out to the 
Danish settlement at Tranquebar (150 miles south of Madras) 
in 1768, and at once began the study of botany with all the 
fervour of an enthusiasm which he succeeded in imparting to 
various correspondents who were then settled near him in 
Southern India. These friends formed themselves into a 
society under the name of ‘‘ The United Brothers,” the chief 
object of their union being the promotion of botanical study. 
Three of these brothers, viz. Heyne, Klein and Rottler, were 
missionaries located near Tranquebar. Gradually the circle 
widened, and before the century closed the enthusiasm for 
botanic research had spread to the younger Presidency of 
Bengal, and the number of workers had increased to about 
twelve, among whom may be mentioned Fleming, Hunter, 
Anderson, Berry, John, Roxburgh, Buchanan (afterwards 
Buchanan-Hamilton), and Sir William Jones, so well known 
as an Oriental scholar. At first it was the custom of this 
brotherhood merely to exchange specimens, but gradually 
names began to be given, and specimens, both named and 
unnamed, began to be sent to botanists of established reput- 
ation in Europe. Many plants of Indian origin came thus to 
be described by Retz, Roth, Schrader, Willdenow, Vahl and 
