INTRODUCTION, 



VII 



The number of Medicinal Plants which it contains, is also very large, Most of the 

 scitaminea?, by their sensible qualities, encourage us to expect from them consider- 

 able efficacy as medicines, not to mention that some of them, as Ginger, Turmeric, 

 and Cardamoms, have been long in use both for medicinal and culinary purposes. 

 It will appear that nearly all the plants of this description mentioned in the catalogue, 

 have been but lately discovered, and placed in the Botanical garden; it must still be 

 the labour of years to ascertain all their useful properties, and to apply them to the vari. 

 ous purposes for which they are fitted. Had they never been collected, however, their 

 virtues and uses would have remained wholly unknown, and all the notice we could 

 have obtained of them must have depended wholly upon the uncertain, and often er- 

 roneous, information which might be accidentally obtained from the natives, whose 

 total want of inquisitiveness, and discrimination, frequently occasion their confound- 

 ing species with each other, which are entirely distinct. 



The facility with which either public or private gardens in Europe may be abundant- 

 ly supplied with plants, is obvious. The nurseries furnish every plant inllbun- 

 dance which has been cultivated for any length of time; and hence a single month 

 would enable a person of property to procure a very extensive collection. But 

 in this country the case is widely different: when plants or seeds, usually cultivated 

 in Europe, are sent to this country, scarcely one in ten of them, on an average, arrives 

 in a living or vegetating state, and of those which grow, perhaps scarcely one in ten 

 succeeds, often because the whole stock is confined to a single plant, the loss of 

 which, if it dies, cannot be repaired; and sometimes, because the seeds arrive at a 

 time improper for sowing them. In other instances, the climate is unfavourable to 

 them, and very frequently the mode of culture proper for these plants when remov- 

 ed to a hot climate, is unknown: little dependance can therefore be placed on sup- 

 plies from England. But among the Natives of the East, there are few who ever 

 think of the productions of nature : the whole number of plants enumerated in their 

 most approved vocabularies, and books on the Materia Medica, does not exceed 

 four or five hundred. Indeed, it often appears a matter of surprize to them, that 

 any person should employ himself in what is to them so useless and unentertain- 

 ing a pursuit as the study of Nature. Europeans are in general so circumstan* 

 ced however, that little can be expected from them unless they have a strong inclina- 



