35 
3- The Botany of the Voyage of the 
“ Endeavour.” 
The “ Introduction ” by Mr. Jinnies Britten of the “ Illustrations of 
the Botany of Captain Cook’s Voyage round the World in H.M.S. 
‘ Endeavour,’ ” is a valuable contribution to our knowledge of Banks’ 
botanical work. 
It may be well to give some description of the various t[SS. connected with the 
voyage, as the published accounts are incomplete or inaccurate. The earliest is 
a catalogue, for the most part in Hanks’ hand, of the plants collected, “ in the 
order in which they were loosely placed in the drying books in which they were 
brought home ” ; in the earliest |)art of this the number of specimens of each plant 
is indicated. This list has been annotated by Solander (who wrote the portion 
relating to New Holland) and Dryander, and is of great service in correlating the 
names temporarily bestowed u])on the ])lants (which are often transcribed on the 
sheets in the Banksian Herbarium) with those under which they were sub.se([uently 
publishe<l. 
During the voyage, the more interesting of the jilants were roughly described 
by Solander, who.se MSS. are now bound in six small quarto volumes — “ Plant® 
Terr® del Fiiego,” (January. ITbO), with which is bound “ Plant® Insul® Sanct® 
Helen®,” (May, 1771); “Plant® Otaheitenses et aliarum ins. Oceani Pacifici,” 
(April to July, 171)9); “Plant® Australi® (\. Zealandia) ” (October, 1769, to 
March, 1770) ; “ Plant® Xov® Holland!®.” (.\i)ril to August, 1770), in two volumes; 
“ Plant® .lavanenses,” (October, 1770, to January, 1771). A transcript of the 
Tierra del Fuego descriptions, systematically arranged and prepared for press, is 
bound in a folio volume with similarly j)repared enumerations of the ])lants collected 
in -Madeira (September, 1708) and Brazil, “ circa Rio de Janeiro ” (November, 
December, 1708), of which no rough .MSS. remain; a second folio volume contains 
the |)repared transcript of the Pacific Islands collection, and a third (paged 
continuously with the ]>receding), the “ Primiti® Flor® Nov® Zealand!®.” A 
similar enumeration of the .lava plants was begun, but extended only to twenty- 
eight pages. 
The -Australian plants, which formed the most important portion of the collection, 
were never arranged for press in the manner of the foregoing, but a transcript of 
the rough MSS. was made, apparently by someone imperfectly acquainted with 
botanical terminology or unable to read the draft, as it contains numerous errors; 
this is bound in two small quarto volumes, and is the basis of the present publica- 
tion, for which it has been collated with the original draft. It has been thought 
a<lvisable to print the descriptions in full as a specimen of Solander’s work and 
as giving details omitted from published accounts of the plants; occasionally a 
word has been supplied or an un])ublished synonym suppressed, but these altera- 
tions are indicated by the use of the square brackets. The MS. includes a largo 
number of descriptions besides those of the plants figured, but only the portion 
relating to these is now j)rintetl. It was evidently, however, not finally prepared 
for publication, as the arrangement is not systematic, and only the plants considered 
as new are inclutled. (Britten, op. cit., Introd., p. 2.) 
