422 On the Transportation of Plants from China to 



that the failure is to be accounted for by, or attributed to, 

 causes very different from those above mentioned. 



If China may be considered as nearly a Terra Incognita 

 to the European botanist ; Botany, as a science, is equally 

 unknown to the Chinese. Their botanical arrangements (if 

 indeed they deserve the name) are extremely defective. 

 No attempt has been made by them to form genera and 

 species ; the place of growth, the use, and the like, being 

 with them the only distinguishing marks of plants. It there- 

 fore cannot be supposed, that any thing like a scientific 

 botanical collection exists in China. With the exception 

 of a scanty Herbal, which was compiled by order of a for- 

 mer emperor, and some meagre articles on plants, in their 

 Encyclopaedias, they have nothing which could have even 

 secured a tolerable uniformity in the names, by which plants 

 are known; so that Europeans (whose intercourse with 

 China has been for the last half century, almost entirely con- 

 fined to the port of Canton), frequently find that plants are 

 not known by the same names, at the distance sometimes of 

 a very few miles. This is a great impediment, and must be 

 severely felt, by all strangers. Every new adventurer must 

 feel himself quite insulated, for he neither can receive ade- 

 quate help himself, nor impart to his assistants the necessary 

 instructions. 



The state of botany in China, may be also pretty cor- 

 rectly understood, by examining the Fa-tee, or flower 

 gardens, situated on the banks of the river, at a short dis- 

 tance from Canton. To these small nursery gardens 

 strangers used to have access at all times ; but for the two 

 or three last years, their visits have been restricted to three 



