BIOGKAPHICAL SKETCH. XXXIX 



and arrange tlie notes which lie left behind has been the en- 

 deavour of the Editor of these volumes. The great Indian 

 fossil collection, mainly the gift of Sir Proby Cautley, but 

 the specimens of which, unique in their richness, stniDendoiis 

 size, and fine preservation, were prepared, identified, and 

 arranged by Falconer, has long constituted one of the chief 

 ornaments of the Palseontological Gallery of the British 

 Museum. There it may be well said of Falconer and of 

 Cautley : ' Si monumentum quaeris, circumspice.' 



In June 1847, on the retirement of the late Dr. Wallich, 

 Dr. Falconer was appointed his successor as Siiperintendent 

 of the Calcutta Botanic Garden, and Professor of Botany in 

 the Medical College ; but for six months, at a considerable 

 pecuniary sacrifice, he contmued to prosecute his work in 

 connection with the ' Fauna Antiqua Sivalensis ; ' and it was 

 not untU December 20, when a longer delay would have 

 ' involved the forfeiture of his commission and his right to a 

 pension,' that he left England. In February, 1848, he entered 

 upon his new duties in Calcutta, and became at once the 

 referee and adviser of the Indian Government and of the 

 Agricultural and Horticultural Society on aU matters per- 

 taining to the vegetable products of India. In 1850 he was 

 deputed to the Tenasserim Provmces, to examine the Teak 

 forests, which were threatened with exhaustion from reckless 

 felling and neglected conservation. His report, suggesting 

 remedial measures, was published in 1850 in the ' Selections 

 from the Records of the Bengal Government,' and is a model 

 of clearness and preciseness on the subject of which it treats.' 

 In 1852 he published, in the ' Journal of the Agricultural 

 and Horticultural Society of India,' a paper on the quinine- 

 yielding Cinchonas and on their introduction into India ; and 

 in the following year the wi-iter of this sketch saw in the 

 Calcutta Botanic Garden a Wardian case containing speci- 

 mens of Cinchona Calisaya, in which Falconer took great 

 interest. Dr. Falconer was not at the time cognizant of 

 Weddell's accurate determination of the species of Cinchona ; 

 but he recommended a trial of them in India, and indicated 

 the hiUy regions in Bengal and the ISTeilgherries in Southern 

 India as the most promising situations for experimental 



' See List of Botanical Memoirs and Reports, at page Ivi, No. 17. 



