4 
THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST. 
[July 2, ]\m. 
Ceylon plaota, in which were iocluded many novelties ; 
a iarther list of additions will be found in the volume 
for 1889. Daring a visit to England in 1886, he went 
carefully through Hermann's Ceylon Herbarium, the 
basis of LinnsBua's Floi'a Zeylanica, and published in the 
.iiinnean Society's Journal (vol. xxiv.) a list of the 
plants therein contained, with the modern equiva- 
lents of the Linnaean names. The short preface to 
this is an excellent example of Trimen's work, 
giving as it does a history of the herbarium, and 
■general notes upon its contents. 
These of course were but preliminaries to what 
.was to hive been the great v/ork of his life— which 
alas! he was not destined to finish. In 1893 ap- 
peared the first volume of the Ilaiidhool to the 
Flora of Ctylon — a work which as I said when re- 
viewing it in these pages,* occupies towards colonial 
floras a position similar to that which the Flora of 
■ Middlesex holds with regard to that of this coun- 
= try. To that review readers must refer for an ac- 
.. count of the work. Had the author been spared, it 
was his intention, as soon as this large undertaking 
. was completed, to compile from it a Handbook of 
' Geylou Plants, analogous to Babington's Manual. 
But it will cause no surprise to those who saw 
' him when he was home last year that Trimen was 
unable to complete his enterprise. He had for 
years suffered from deafness, and this had become 
total, so that he wag only able to carry on con- 
versation with the aid of a pencil and paper. One 
leg was then entirely paralyzed, and although in 
spite of these and other troubles hn maintained his 
' old cheerfulness of demeanour, it was very painful 
to his old fi lends to see the state to which he had 
i been reduced. We had hoped that he would not 
go back to Ceylon, but there were reasons — among 
• them that anxiety to complete his Flora which, as 
• we shall see, was with him literally to the last— which 
• induced him to do so ; and I think no one expected 
- he would ever return to England. 
I am indebted to his elder brother, Mr. Roland 
Trimen, a distinguished entomologist, for the fol- 
lowing account of the closing scene of Trimen's 
, earthly career : — 
"After the attack in August last, which deprived 
. him of all power in his left leg, my brother seemed 
' to rally somewhat, though confined almost entirely 
to his room, being only taken out into the Gardens 
at his own request two or three times. On Wednes- 
day morning, October 14th, he was suddenly seized 
with a feeling of chilliness and violent shakings of 
the hands and arms, his voice being at the same 
time somewhat affected. This he himsdt did not 
regard seriously, but Mr. Freeman at once went to 
Kandy to summon the doctor. He lay helpless all 
the day, and had to be fed with what little nourish- 
'. ment he was able to take. In the later half of the 
night he slept well, and on Thursday morning his 
first words were that he felt rather better, and 
must get up and do a little work at the 'Flora.' 
This he actually did in the afternoon, and with 
great effort made a few notes, which, Freeman writes, 
are scarcely decipherable. This pathetic endeavour 
still to work on seems to have been the last flicker 
of his strength; for duiing the fleepless night of 
Thursday, the 15th, his attempts to speak Wfre almost 
inaudible, and on Friday he lapinly passed into a 
state of coma, though sometimes looking up and 
smiling when anything was done for him. He was 
evidently sinking all the afteiuoon and evening, but 
was as evidently free from any pain. Between nine 
anil ten in the evening Mr. Freeman was called aM'.iy 
for a little, and the hospital attendant on his re- 
turn reported a change. As iMr Freeman entered 
the room Henry turned his head towards Lini, and 
then liiy quietly back, and passed away without a 
tremour or movement of any kind. 
" The funeral took place at Kandy on the morning 
of Sunday, October 18th, and was attended by two 
hundred of the Eurojiean community and by a gieat 
number of natives, both headmen and Garden 
employes. Henry's old servant, Bob Appu, never 
left the back of the hearse throughout the rcule from 
Peradeuiya ; and on the pievious day my nephew 
writes that he had about 400 npplicatioi^s^ from 
natives (old servants', village headmen, &c.) to see 
'the old master.' The burial tock place in the 
Mahaiyawa Cemetery, Henry'.s body being laid not 
far from the resting-place of his predecessor, Dr. 
Thwaites." 
[The portrait here reproduced was ti.kin by 
Messrs. Cameron cuiirg Dr. Tiimeu's visit to 
England in 1887. ] 
.Jamks Bbitten, 
We may supplenieiiL llie above witii a few "notes" 
from a series of letters on local Botanists which 
recently appeared in the Ceylon Observer: — 
The present state of knowledge of Ceyion Botany 
undoubtedly owes more to Dr. Trimen, who succcec'ed 
Dr. Thwiiitts in 1880, than even to the laboma 
of his illustrious predecessors. Assuming the dutiei 
of head of our Botanical Department at the age 
of 39,* with an already established reputation in 
Europe as a botanist, he by his great acquirementa 
and steady demotion to science rendered yeoman 
service to the botanical woild generally for 10 years, 
his death, while truly in harriess, occuning in October 
1896. Prom the outset the reoi ginisation of bis 
department upon more modern and utilitai ian prin' i- 
ples received his special attentioi', simultaneously 
with the investigation of the local flora, collecting 
and describing new species and eki idatifg ones 
hitherto imperfectly understood. He w s an authority 
on Quinology, and in 188.^ was c gaged by the 
Madras Government to report on certain prob'ema 
connected with the Cinchona industry of the Nil£;i,-i8. 
In l!-8') he issued his Systematic Catalogue of I'lower- 
inrf I'laiits and Ferns Jndir/enous to Cri/lon ivo. new 
out of print; whilst in lSb'8 he pnblislie I Yiia I/orlus 
Zeijlaincus, being a clasilied list of plants grown in 
* Journ. Dot. 1803, 375. 
* Keally in his 37th year.*— Ed. T,A, 
