274 
THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST, [October t, 1887. 
tree is, that when the seedlings are two years old, 
they are cut off close to the ground, and the new 
shoots grow straight up to a h sight of 10 feet or 
more without a branch, in a single , year. 
When the tree attains a girth of from 3 to 4 feet, 
the timber is available for use for Tea-boxes. In 
Japan, the tree is sawn off, every 8 or 10 years, 
very close to the ground, and the new shoots grow 
straight up to a height of 10 feet or more, without 
a branch in a single year. 
Dr. Meyer, who supplies us with all this iuform- 
ation, offers to provide the Forest Department with 
seeds from Japan, and we trust that his offer will 
be availed of, and the seeds distributed to such as 
are willing to experiment with them. 
It would be no small thing gained if we could 
grow in the Terai and hill districts of India a wood 
more suitable for Tea-boxes than that we now possess, 
and although, perhaps, it may seem a long time to 
look forward to for the realization of any personal 
advantage from such cultivation, yet the land thus 
planted with wood of an unaltering value, would 
always be by so much enhanced in saleable merit. 
We commend the subject to the attention of owners 
of tea properties, who may find thus, in time, their 
timber land even more valuable than the laud under 
the tea itself. — Indian Tea Gazette. 
THE ROYAL BOTANIC GARDEN, 
CALCUTTA. 
The annual report on these gardens for the past year 
opens with the following interesting retrospect of a 
hundred years' work. Dr. George King, the superin- 
tendent, writes : — 
" It may not be inappropriate to begin the hun- 
dredth annual report of the garden by giving a brief 
account of its history, which is, to a very great ex- 
tent, a history of Indian Botany. 
" 1. The suggestion to form a Botanic Garden 
here was first made to the Government in Calcutta 
in June 1786, by Colonel Robert Kyd, then Superin- 
tendent of the Hon'ble Company's Dockyard at 
Kidderpore. The proposal was favourably entertained 
by the Governor-General, and its adoption was recom- 
mended to the Supreme Board in London during the 
same month, practical effect being given to it during 
the following year by the selection, as a site, of a 
large piece of land immediately below Colonel Kyd's 
private garden at Shalimar. This piece of laud, 
besides the Botanic Garden as it is now limited, 
included about fifty acres which form part of the 
grounds of the present Engineering College. Colonel 
Kyd was himself an ardent horticulturist, and he had 
brought together in his private garden at Shalimar a 
large collection of exotic plants, chiefly from the 
Straits. He was, therefore, very appropriately appointed 
the first Superintendent of the Botanic Garden which 
had been founded at his suggestion. Colonel Kyd 
continued to perform the duties of Superintendent 
until his death in 1793. On Colonel Kyd's death 
Government decided to put the garden under the 
charge of a special officer who should have no other 
duty. Dr. William Roxburgh, the Company's Botanist 
in Madras, was therefore transferred from that Pre- 
sidency, and was installed at Seebpore in November 
1793. No better selection than that of Dr. Roxburgh, 
could have been made. Dr. Roxburgh, for many 
years prior to his transfer, had been engaged in study- 
ir g the then little-known Flora of the Northern 
Circars in the Madras Presidency. He was a moat 
ardent and enthusiastic botanist, and a good gardener. 
Dr. Roxburgh continued to be Superintendent until 
1814, when he was obliged to proceed to the Cape 
on account of his health. From the Cape he went 
on to St. Helena, and from thence to England, where 
he died during the following year. Dr. Roxburgh 
wan the first botanist who attempted to draw up a 
systematic account of the plants of India. During 
1 1 i h t;usy life in this couutry he prepared a I'/nra 
Indira, which contained systematic descriptions of 
all the indigenous plants knows to him, as well as 
pf many exotics then in cultivation in the neighbour- 
hood of Calcutta. The manuscript of this work he 
took with him vhen he left India, intending to 
publish it during his residence in England. His 
death prevented the execution of this plan ; and with 
the exception of tie first volume, which was printed 
with some additions and interpolations by Drs. Wallich 
and Carey, in 1820, the book remained unpublised 
until 1832. In the latter year it was printed, exactly 
as the author had left it, by the piety of his sons, 
Captains James and Bruce Roxburgh, neither of whom 
was a botanist. T-iis book is the basis of all sub- 
sequent Indian BoUnical works. It is an admirable 
production : the descriptions are accurate and graphic, 
and its authorship justly entitles Roxburgh to his 
title of the Father of Indian Botauy. Until the 
year 1872, when the publication of the " Flora of British 
India " was begun by the distinguished botanist, Sir 
Joseph Hooker, Roxburgh's was the only single book 
through which a knowledge of Indian plants could 
be acquired. A second edition of this excellent manual 
was issued by, Mr. C. B. Clarke in 1874 at a merely 
nominal price, Mr. Clarke's desire being to put the book 
within the reach of the poorest student. Besides the 
Flora Indica, Roxburgh published, at the expense of the 
Honourable Company, in three large folio volumes, his 
Flantce CoromandeliuntP, being descriptions with figurse 
of three hundred of the most striking plant6 of the 
Coromandel Coast. Dr. Roxburgh was immediately 
succeeded in the Superintendentship of the Garden 
by Dr. Francis Buchanan (afterwards Hamilton), who 
at the time wis on special duty in connection with 
an extended enquiry into the agriculture of India 
and in the collection of materials for a Gazetteer. 
Dr. Hamilton, who was an accomplished botanist 
and zoologist, collected a vast mass of material, part 
of which was published in his own name, but the 
bulk of which, after many years' suppression, was 
published under the title of "Montgomery Martin's 
History: Topography and Statistics of Eastern India." 
Dr. Buchanan-Hamilton held charge of the garden for 
only a short limej and he was succeeded in 1817 by 
Dr. Nathaniel) Wallich, lately Surgeon to the Danish 
Settlement atiSerampore. Dr. Wallich was an able 
and most energetic botanist ; and, during the earlier 
part of his term of office, he organised collecting 
expeditions iito the remote and then little known 
regions of Ku(naon, Nepal, Silhet, Tenasserim, Penang 
and Singapore. Dr. Wallich in fact undertook a 
botanical survey of a large part of the Indian Empire. 
The material^ (in the shape of dried specimens of 
plants) thus Accumulated were taken by Dr. Wallich 
to London, aid, after being named there by himself 
and by other botanists, they were distributed in num- 
bered collections to the leading botanical institutions 
in Europe. Il this great distribution, Dr. Wallich 
included the collections of several other botanists 
which had befen made over to him for the purpose. 
The liberality Vith which these specimens were given 
away was so extreme, that in the garden report for 
the year 1843,1 we find Dr. Griffith (who had been 
appointed to pfficiate for Dr. Wallich during his 
absence in England) complaining that the herbarium 
had been completely denuded of every specimen 
collected during; the first fifty years of the existence 
of the garden., Besides distributing this enormous 
collection, Dr. Wallich was enabled through the 
munificence of the Honourable Company, to publish, 
under the title Plantce Asiatic® Rariores, three superb 
volumes illustrated by coloured figures of a high degree 
of excellence. Dr. Wallich retired in 1846 aud died in 
1854. During the lengthened absences of Dr. Wallich 
in Europe, his place at the garden was filled by Dr. 
W. Griffith, whose premature death deprived Botanical 
Science of one of its ablest and most industrious 
votaries. Dr. Griffith's extensive notes and numerous 
drawings were, after his death, bublished by Govern- 
ment in nine volumes. Dr. Wallich was succeeded 
by Dr. Hugh Falconer. Dr. Falconer was a Palaeonto- 
logist, well known by his researches on the Sivalik 
P'ossil Mammalia. In 1850 he left the country on 
account of ill health, aud was succeeded as Superin- 
tendent by Dr. Thomas Thomson, a traveller and 
botanist of much ability, the coadjutor of Sir Josep 
