ON THE BOTANICAL WORK DONE IN THE GENUS PRIMULA. 43 
volume of the ''Flora of British India," published in 1882, Sir 
J. D. Hooker described and classified the 43 Himalayan species. 
In 1891, in the 26th volume of the Journal of the Linnean 
Society, my colleague, Mr. W. Botting Hemsley, F.R.S., gave an 
enumeration and an account of the distribution of 43 Chinese 
species, and in the 29th volume of the same journal he described 
three new species discovered by Mr. Pratt on the confines of 
China and Tibet. A few additional species have been recently 
described and figured by Professor Oliver in Hooker's " Icones 
Plantarum," and by the Japanese botanists in the Japanese Jo?6m(xZ 
of Botany. We have now in the Kew Herbarium specimens of 
54 distinct species from China and Japan. The total number of 
species now known is about 150, of which, in round numbers, 
one-third are Himalayan, one-third Chinese and Japanese, and 
the other third spread through Europe, Northern Asia, and 
America. The European species all belong to three out of the 
twenty groups recognised by Dr. Pax, and in the appended 
table I have shown how the Himalayan, Chinese, and Japanese 
species are distributed through these twenty groups. 
P.S. — In Part II. of the Bulletin of the Museum of Natural 
History of Paris, just received, three new Chinese species are 
described : P. chartacea, allied to P. obconica ; P. sinuata, allied 
to P. Wattii ; and P. hreviscapa, allied to P. sonchifolia. 
Name of Group 
Type Species 
Total 
China 
Japan 
Hima- 
layas 
1. Sinenses . . . 
15 
7 
1 
9 
2. Fallaces . . . 
P. yesonana Miq. . . . 
4 
3 
8. Monocarpicte 
P. malacoides, Franch. . 
2 
2 
4. rioribundffi . , 
P. verticillata, Forsk. . . 
3 
5. Petiolares . . . 
P. petiolaris, Wallich . . 
3 
1 
2 
6. Bullatffi . . . 
P. bullata, Franch, . . 
4 
4 
7. Vernales . . . 
3 
8. Soldanelloides . 
P. pusilla, Wallich . . 
8 
3 
5 
9. Auriculata; . . 
P. auriculata, Lam. . . 
8 
1 
2 
10. Capitatae . . . 
P. capitata, Hook. . . 
7 
3 
5 
11. Farinosffi . . . 
11 
3 
i 
3 
12. Minutissinice . . 
P. minutissima, Jacq. 
3 
3 
13. Tenellfe . . . 
P. tenella, King . . . 
6 
2 
4 
14. Nivales . . . 
P. nivalis, Pall. . . . 
13 
6 
z 
4 
15. Barbatae . . . 
P. vinciflora, Franch. 
3 
1 
2 
16. Macrocarpete 
P. macrocarpa, Max. . . 
7 
1 
17. Calianthae . . 
P. obtusifolia, Royle . . 
11 
5 
5 
18. Cordifoliae . . 
P. reticulata, Wallich . . 
6 
5 
19. Proliferffi . . . 
P. japonica, Gray . . . 
9 
7 
1 
1 
20. AuriculaB . . . 
21 
- 
147 
46 
11 
50 
