Feb. 1, 1901. J THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST. 311 
Bambiise vulgaris, which is considered there to famish 
only moderate building material. Indeed bamboo, as 
such, does not by any means play that important part 
in Ceylon which it does with us. This is one of 
the reasons wby the native villages there, appear so 
dirty and unsightly. As regards cleanliness and 
neatness they cannot compare with our West Java 
villages. 
Having got out at Peradeniya station at 11 o'clock, 
we were, a few minutes later, hospitably entertained 
by Mr. Willis in his house. 
We owe a double debt of gratitude to Mr. Wills 
and his wife for their friendly hospitality, as Pera- 
deniya is indeed a station bac no town ; there is 
only the little native village Iriagama on the other side 
of the river directly one crosses the satin-wood 
bridge. There are no lodgings to be had there for 
the public ; and had it not been for the very much 
appreciated hospitality extended to us we should 
have been obliged to have often been on the run be- 
tween Peradeniya and Kandy, a distance of about 
four miles. 
The Botanical Garden at Peradeniya was established 
in 1821, thus only four years later than ours at Buiten- 
zorg, and managed by A, Moon, who was an ardent 
student of Ceylon flora, and in 1821, published a cata- 
logue of Ceylon plants. Unluckily Moon died in 1825 
of fever. 
For Twenty years the institution was left to take 
care of itself, and coffee, breadfruit and coconut were 
cultivated for the Government, " whilst botanical 
•cieuce was completely neglected." It is difficult 
to avoid the reflection in passing, iu how many res- 
pects the history of the garden at Peradeniya is 
similar to that of our establishment at Biiitenzorg: 
similar conditions resembling each other have had 
most prejudicial results at the beginning. In 1814 
there was much improvement in the condition of 
Peradeniya by the appointment of Gardner, a capable 
botanist and energetic traveller, who Wdut all over 
the island and, as a result of his travels, obtained 
a number of new plants for the garden. After 
Gardner's death in 1849 Dr, Thwaites was appointed 
Director. It was under the directorship of Thwaites, 
extending over a period of thirty years, that a series 
of improvements were introduced, and the institution 
acquired not only the necessary stability but a 
world-wide reputation. With his gteat merits, Thwaites 
had however also peculiarities in the catalogue of his 
time not quite inexplicable — of which I received 
assurances some years ago from very trustworthy 
sources, Himself thorougly knowing Ceylon plants, 
he thought that what was not serviceable to him 
was of no use to others, and labels on plants in 
the garden were considered quite unnecessary. More- 
over he had conceived the ilea, more inexplicable, 
that a botanical garden in the tropics ought to be 
a small edition ot the primitive vegetation with all 
its capricious varieties of forms. As a result of 
this way of viewing the matter, he not only did not 
strive to follow the principle of arranging all plants 
resembling each other according to the natural system, 
but purposely rejected the same. During this period 
we entertained and carried out diametrically opposed 
ideas. 
Although there perhaps lurks just a spark of exaggera- 
tion in this proposition, it is certain that Dr. H. 
Trimen, who succeeded Thwaites, as Director, found it 
necessary in 1880— when the undersigned came to Bui- 
tenzorg — to cause some modilioation in both these said 
views, and many improvements were also introduced by 
him. When this amiable savant honoured us A/ith 
a visit to Buitenzong some years ago, he was suffer- 
ing with deafness ; but we had then no idea that this was 
only the premonitory symptom of a serious illness, 
which ended in total deafness and partial paralysis, 
and a couple of years later brought this excellent 
and highly-qualified man to the grave. If the 
garden at Peradeniya is under a debt of gratitude 
to him, he has moreover built a lasting monument 
to Ipotauical science by the compilation of his Flora 
of Ceylon, of which the greater part was published 
dunug tiis life-time. The publication of the rest of 
the wotk was due to the zeal of Sir James Hooker 
Oiu- hospitable host, Mr. J. C. Willis, m.a., succeeded 
Dr. Trimen. 
The choice of a site for founding the garden at Pera- 
deniya was specially fortunate. On three sides it 
IS bounded by the windings of the Mahaweliganga, 
the broadest river of Ceylon, which forms as it 
were an eye in which the garden is enclosed. Th« 
banks of this splended river, in comparison with 
which our Tjiliwong is a little mountain stream 
are for the most part planted with a luxurious 
growth of bamboos and create a deep and regal 
impression, especially when seen from the satinwood 
Budge (a, from a technical point of view, fairly 
long suspension bridge built entirely of wood) on 
the south-west side ot the garden. 
On entering the " Eoyal Botanic Gardens " of Pera- 
deniya one passes round a beautiful grove of palms 
and reaches the commencement of a long straight 
road wtiich runs to almost the back of the garden. 
The first part of this road is adorned on both sidea 
with a large variety of bushes and low flower-planta, 
standing partly along-side and partly under various 
fine trees. The attentive upkeep of this approach 
at once creates an agreeable impression. 
About halt-way up the road it runs right through 
a very large lawn with a collection of palms in tha 
centre surrounded by a circular path : " the great 
arch." The whole of this lawn and its surroundings 
are laid out in the well-known broad English 
park-style. Conceived in the same spirit, but still 
prettier are the surroundings of the " mouumeot road" 
('loading to the "Gardner monument") with fine 
speoirnens of various trees {Pometia exuiiia. Ter- 
minalia Belerie, Terminalia Catappa, Ficus Saccifera.) 
Between this " Monument Eoad " and the aforesaid 
"great arch" but closer to the latter there are the places 
which serve as the office, museum, herbarium, library 
and laboratory. The herba-rium is of course of much 
value especially for the or ginal specimens of Ceylon 
plants which it contains ■, there is besides a ve-y in- 
tertesting and beautifully executed collection of coloured 
drawings of plants made iu the instifcuti m itself. 
For the rest, to one from Buitenzorg, as regards 
the appointments there is not much to be said. It 
would be a break of that courtesy which demands 
that a guest should be no critic, to say that tha 
arrangements as regards the laboratory were wholly 
inadequate, so that at the instance of Mr. Willis 
it wai intended to build a special and properly 
equipped laboratory which probably is now in use. 
It is not without a feeling of perhaps weli-grounded 
satisfaction, that one sees the idea, carried oufc 
in Buitenzorg 15 years ago, to have laboratories 
attached to the garden, adopted now iu another 
botanical garden in the tropics. 
As the part of the garden where a system atio 
grouping of plants is adopted is still new and not 
extensive (behind the Director's residence), and at 
in the greatest portion of the garden such an arrange- 
ment is not adopted— as apoears from what has been 
said already— the principles followed at the foundation 
call for no special remarks. This is not tlie place 
to give a list of plant-names taken from our iiot«8 
or from the " Hand-guida to the Koyal Botanio 
Gard ens, Peradeniya." However we ought to mention 
some strikingly interesting or specially well-developed 
specimens, and especially, in the first place, a mala 
specimen m flower of Lodoicea Sechellarum, soma 
what older than ours, and flowering and fruit bearing 
species of Coiironpita Gwjanensis, the remarkable 
West-Indian cannon-ball-tree which quite recently 
blossomed in our garden for the first time. Among 
the really tine specimens found in Peradeniya must 
be mentioned Pterocarpus indica, Amherstea nobilis, 
Schleiohera trojuga, Artocarpus nohilii and Pericops 
Moonianc. The samn remarks applies to the remarkably 
large and robust collection of Burmese giant-bamboos, 
Denilroealamus qiganteut (the same kind of which A 
