186 JACK'S LETTERS TO WALLICH, 3 819-1821. 



new Sonerilce. 13 ' I find here a species of Xepentlies different from 

 all the Singapore ones, and evidently the N. phyllamphora, Lour., 138 

 which is also the cantltarifera, Rumph., differing from the N. 

 distillatoria in having petiolate leaves, urns ventricose at the lower 

 part, and the striated margin depressed or flattened. Sir Stamford 

 proposes that we should send the Nepenthes with a few more of 

 the most interesting of our discoveries home to be published in a 

 small fascicle, in the most splendid style that they can be executed 

 in, colored figures of the full natural size. I think it would be 

 a good thing to attract attention to the subject. It may or may 

 not be continued, according to circumstances. Give me your 

 idea on the subject. You know that Sir S. has brought a print- 

 ing press with him ; he proposes keeping it constantly employed 

 in printing papers on Natural History, and on a variety of other 

 subjects of local information. He lias himself a mass of papers 

 on the Eastern Islands, which in their present MSS. form, are hut 

 little available, and of course liable to accidents and destruction ; 

 these he proposes printing, in order to preserve them and to afford 

 the means of distributing them to a certain extent. He proposes 

 to go on for some time printing without publishing, but after a 

 little to make selections from among the materials thus collected, 

 of which to form a volume which may be published quarterly or 

 as matter sufficient may accumulate. In this way a great deal 

 will be preserved of considerable interest : but perhaps not finished 

 enough for the established channels of information as the Asiatic 

 Eesearches &c. 1H0 For instance we think of printing descriptions 

 of plants, whether new or not, which can then be distributed to 

 a few, better than in MSS. I would send to you, Mr. Brown &c. 

 for your observations, after which what was really valuable might 

 be made public or not, and in such way or channel as would appear 

 afterwards eligible. By the bye, in what state are the vols, of 

 the Asiatic Society, is there any likely soon to appear? 14 " Sir S. 



137. These Sonerilas were not described by Jack. 



138. Nepenthes phyllamphora, Willd., was described in print by Jack 

 in proofsheets for the Malayan Miscellanies which were reprinted in 

 Hooker's Companion to the Botanical magazine i. (1835) p. 271 with the 

 remark ' ' abundant in moist places and ravines in the neighbourhood of 

 Bencoolen. ' ' Later botanists have collected it on the same coasts. 



139. Rajendra Lala Mitra in his part of the Centennial Review of the 

 Asiatic Society of Bengal (1883) p. 50, referring to the Asiatic!: Eesearches 

 says ' ' a heavy quarto volume necessarily suggested elaborate and finished 

 essays, and in the selection of papers for it, short notes describing new 

 discoveries or new ideas, however interesting were frequently rejected. ' ' 

 And he continues by recording that many members of the Society were dis- 

 satisfied at the slowness of publication and its insufficiency. A motion was 

 even brought forward for improvement but though it passed, it effected little. 



Possibly, had the Society felt itself able to provide the outlet, 

 its prestige being so great, Wilson's Quarterly Oriental Journal, the 

 Transactions of the Medical and Physical Society of Calcutta, and the 

 Malayan Miscellanies would not have sprang up as small octavos for notes 

 rather than essays, and for early publication. 



140. See note 124 on p. 183. 



Jour. Straits Branch 



