COLONIAL HERBARIUM. 



REPORT FOR THE YEAR 1898, 



The year just ended has been one of considerable activity in 

 the Herbarium, for though no very large number of specimens 

 have been added to the collection, work of other kinds has kept 

 both my assistant and myself very fully occupied. 



The first part of " Natal Plants " was published in June, and 

 to that part my assistant, Miss Lauth, contributed 16 of the 

 plates, of the second part 30 plates are now finished, and of 

 these 17 were drawn by Miss Lauth in the Herbarium, the 

 remainder by Mr. Haygarth who will complete the volume. 

 The whole of the descriptions were done in the Herbarium by 

 Mr. Evans and myself, and we hope to have the second part of 

 the volume completed and ready for publication about the 

 middle of the present year. The third decade of " New Natal 

 Plants " has not yet been published, but Mr. Evans and I hope 

 to send it for publication early in the year. The work of 

 collation, mounting, and cataloguing the specimens which I 

 receive in exchange takes up a great deal of time, some at any 

 rate of which might be much better employed, and I have at 

 the latter part of the year found that an educated Indian can 

 do a large portion of this work, and also the poisoning fairly 

 "well, and thus my assistant is relieved of a considerable amount 

 of merely manual labour ; the comparison of the specimens, 

 entering and ticket writing, however, an Indian cannot be 

 trusted to do. A number of specimens of indigenous plants 

 have been sent for identification, and if persons would only 

 remember that fairly complete specimens are required, the 

 names of the plant sent, could, in nearly all cases, be 

 supplied to the sender, but to expect that a plant shall 

 be identified by a single leaf, a piece of bark, or 

 a flower or two, not properly dried, and usually spoiled 

 in transit, is expecting rather too much ; if persons will 

 only take care to send good representative specimens, dry them 



