NOTES ON THE FLORA OF SUMATRA 
By E. D. Merrill 
{From the Botanical Section of the Biological Laboratory, Bureau of 
Science, Manila) 
In the year 1860-61 Miquel ^ published a general summary 
of the Sumatran flora, enumerating all the species of Spermato- 
phyta then known from the island and the neighboring smaller 
ones, especially Bangka. This work was based primarily on the 
collections of Teysmann, Dieyenhorst, Horsfield, Korthals, Jung- 
huhn, Zollinger, and Amman, and includes 2,642 species, of 
which about 700 were described by Miquel as new. Since Mi- 
quel’s publication was issued, comparatively little has been pub- 
lished on the Sumatran flora as such. Some large collections 
of plants have been made, notably that by Beccari, but with the 
exception of the recent collections of Robinson and Kloss, those 
made by other botanists since Miquel’s time have not been 
thoroughly studied. 
In 1884 Van Hasselt and Boerlage ^ published a small contri- 
bution to our knowledge of the Sumatran flora, this being based 
on the relatively unimportant botanical collections made by the 
Veth expedition in connection with its anthropological and zoo- 
logical investigations. In this work about 170 species are enu- 
merated, a large number of them cellular cryptogams. Of the 
spermatophytes but four are described as new, most of the 
others enumerated having already been recorded from Sumatra. 
The Sumatran collections made by Dr. S. H. Reorders in 
1890 have been enumerated by Mrs. Reorders,® these totaling 
not more than 450 species in all groups, a considerable number 
of which have been determined only to the genus, and some 
only to the family. Of these species collected by Doctor Reorders 
^Miquel, A. F. W., Florae Indiae Batavae. Supplementum I. Prodro- 
mus Florae Sumatranae (1860-61) XX + 1-656, t. 1-A. German edition, 
Sumatra, seine Pfianzenwelt und deren Erzeugnisse (1862) XXIV + 1-656, 
t. 1-Ji. 
’ Van Hasselt, A. L. and Boerlage, J. G., Bijdragen tot de kennis der 
flora van Midden-Sumatra, in Veth, P. J. Midden-Sumatra 4 part 2 ’ 
(1884) 1-49, t. 1-8. 
* Koorders-Schumacher, A., Syst. Verzeich. Herb. Koord. 2 (1910-11) 
1-62. 
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