APRIL — JUNE, 1857.] Observations 071 Provincial Uxhtbittons. 11 
vinces, is a recommendation from the Government of Fort St. 
George for the establishment of a BotanicalGarden at Madras and for 
the employment of not less than two able and experienced Botanists 
and Mineralogists who should be kept continually moving about 
the country, in order that a thorough knowledge of the rich and 
varied productions of Southern India might be rapidly acquired 
and turned to account. 
In the Minute of the Right Honorable the Governor, regret is 
expressed that nothing more (that is than assisting the Agri-Hor- 
ticultural Societ^^) should have been done by Government for gain- 
ing an extensive and practical knowledge of the botanical produc- 
tions of this province, that is the Madras Presidency. This ob- 
servation appears to me should have been qualified with the words 
" at present," for I believe that much has been done at different 
times, and that we possess as good a knowledge of the Botany of 
India including the Madras Presidency, as of any other extra Euro- 
pean country. Much of course still remains to be done as in most 
other countries, but the want at present is rather to systematise and 
to render easily accessible to the public the information that has 
been accumulated, than to make investigations by the aid of those 
who would have to spend some time in becoming acquainted with 
what has already been done, before they could proceed to make new 
discoveries. That I do not take too favourable a view of what has 
been done, it would be enough to refer to the preface, p. XI. of 
Dr. Wight's Prodromus to the Flora of the Peninsula of India, where 
the labours of Koenig, of Anderson, Berry, John, Roxburgh, Heyne, 
Klein, Buchanan Hamilton, and of the venerable Rottler, are re- 
ferred to. Of these, several were supported by Government in 
their investigations. Dr. Wight's own, though incomplete work, is 
itself a record of what has been done to a certain extent, and no 
better service could be done for diffusing a correct knowledge of 
Peninsular Botany, than the completion of this work. ^In his illus- 
trated work '* Icones Florae Indise Peninsulae," he has given ex- 
cellent representations of about 2,000 Peninsular plants, independ- 
ent of 300 plants figured by Dr. Roxburgh in his Coromandel 
plants and those in Rheede's Hortus Malabaricus. Dr. Cleghorn, 
