I2 HISTORY OF THE INVESTIGATION OF THE FLORA OF SURINAM. 



Berlin to work out my material of Malpighiaceae and Erythroxylaceae 

 respectively. Mr. Sprague of Kew was so kind to determine some Bignoniaceae 

 for me. I wish to express here my best thanks to these gentlemen. The 

 specimens mentioned of the various species, have been enumerated with 

 indication of the collector, the number in the collection and the herbarium 

 in the order of the localities where they were found, the most eastern 

 localities having been taken first, the most western last. Since the collections 

 were chiefly made along the rivers, the place where they were found can 

 in this way easily be indicated. The plants along the same river have 

 been enumerated in the order from the mouth to the source, with the 

 addition of Lower and Upper river. Lower river I have always called the 

 part below the rapids. When nothing is added to the name of the col- 

 lector, this means that the specimen is at Utrecht. This does not apply 

 to Kegel's herbarium which is at Gottingen only, so that the addition 

 herb. Gotting, was unnecessary. With the specimens which I did not see, 

 the source is always mentioned. Specimens without indication of locality have 

 been enumerated together after the other specimens with the addition "Surinam". 



I had much difficulty in obtaining the vernacular names. One can find 

 these names in a number of works and there exist even special lists, e. g. 

 that of Westerouen van Meteren, containing botanical and vernacular names 

 of Surinamian plants. All these names seem to me to be often unreliable 

 and I do not believe that they are based on the determination of specimens 

 provided with that vernacular name. I rather believe that they had their 

 origin in the borrowing of somewhat similar names from French Guyana. 

 Another fact which makes great care neccessary in the use of indigenous 

 names is the very insufficient botanical knowledge of the negroes who yet 

 as a rule are applied to, when we wish to know the vernacular name of 

 a plant. Plants which resemble each other are regularly mixed up and not 

 only are the species of the same genus called by the same name, but often 

 also plants of entirely different families, as e. g. Euphorbiaceae and Amaran- 

 taceae. To this must be added the peculiarity of the negro of often 

 mentioning any name, if the plant in question is unknown to him. With 

 the different collections I received from Surinam this often became clearly 

 evident to me and during my stay in Surinam I also had numerous in- 

 stances of it. In this respect the Indians are much more reliable ; moreover 

 they know plants much better. The few Indian names occurring on the 

 collections from Surinam as a rule agree perfectly with those given by 

 Aublet. But on account of the small number of the Indian population of 

 Surinam, travellers have seldom met them and the number of names thus 

 known is very small. 



All these reasons induced me to use only those vernacular names 

 which occur on the labels of collected specimens. I was afraid to make 

 the confusion only greater if I also gave a place to the other names. 



