MiscelktiWijusl 92. > 



idleness* aiijl :a'i! : , have been open to the instruction of the Society and its officers. 

 But for Sir Henry Blake calling the Agricultural Board into existence we should 

 not have had this spectacle of headmen uniting in an earnest attempt to improve 

 the condition of the labouring classes. It tempts one to remark that the people 

 who had got into hopeless grooves Avere not merely confined to the goiya-class, 

 but that indifference and stagnation had even spread to the highest branches of the 

 Revenue Service. Those who are in the habit of reading administration reports 

 know what a dry and dolorous task that is. Why should not Government Agents 

 and their assistants be encovuaged to make their reports more interesting and 

 more "live" by describing the efforts they have made and the experiments they 

 have initiated for bettering the condition of the masses over whom they are placed 

 in charge. For years these revenue officers have gone on on narrow stereotyped 

 lines. Let them take fresh courage and help themselves in the aivakening of 

 the masses and earn the gratitude of posterity instead of being content as now to 

 crowd their reports Avith masses of uniuteligible statistics regarding crime, village 

 requirements in the Avay of roads and bridges, &c. -Ceylon Independent. 



The Literature of Economic Botany and Agriculture. 1. 



By J. C. Willis. 



Those Avho are engaged in the answering of questions relating to these topics 

 must often wish that there were some convenient index to the endless books, articles 

 in journals, and other publications dealing Avith them. With a view to providing 

 some slight help to such persons, and to the large public that is more or less 

 interested in these matters, I have undertaken the publication, at odd times, of the 

 lists of such publications which are kept in my own office. The system there adopted 

 is simple. The office receives almost every journal that contains anything of value 

 relating to tropical agriculture or economic botany. Before being passed to the rack 

 of " Additions to the Library," every single one of these journals is looked through 

 by myself, and the titles of its contained articles are indexed upon a series of sheets 

 of paper, kept in alphabetical order, and each headed with the name of some product. 

 In the case of common products, especially such as are produced by several distinct 

 plants, the common name is used, as tea, cacao, indiarubber, &c., in other cases the 

 scientific generic name is used as Aberia, Acacia, Adansouia. In this way a file is 

 formed, to Avhich I can refer at any time, and find out some at any rate of the 

 numerous articles dealing with the different products. 



In giving the folloAving lists, therefore, I wish it to be distinctly understood 

 that they are not necessarily complete, nor do they in general go back further than 

 1899 or 1900, but for the papers published since that time they at any rate approach 

 to completeness. 



Journals dealing with tropical agriculture copy so largely from one another 

 that articles, obviously copied, are not indexed a second time here. 



Owing to my absence on leave in 1902-8 and my accident of last year s the 

 publications of those periods are not quite fully indexed. 



It is especially hoped that these lists may add (in a sense) to the Library 

 Catalogue at Peradeniya, and enable the visitor to make the best use of the library. 



Aberia.— The kei apple {A . caffra, Hook.). Queensland Agr. Jl. , June, 1899, p. 468. 

 Acacia.— Notizblatt k. Bot. Gtns. Berlin, II, 1898, p. 176. 



Commercial uses of Indian Acacias. " T. A." Nov. 1903, p. 308. 

 Culture des Acacies et leur production en tanin. Revue des Cult. 



Col. Juinl904, p. 331. 

 Wattle Bark. " T. A." Suppl. : June. 1904, p. 863. 



