The Royal Botanic Gardens of Ceylon, 
and their History. 
BY 
J. C. WILLIS. 
rr^HE commencement of a new century, and with it of the 
present Journal, affords a good opportunity for a brief 
sketch of the present position and past history of the well- 
known scientific establishment over which the writer has 
the honour to preside. In recent years, especially, a con- 
siderable expansion of the scope of the Department, and of 
the work carried on by it, has taken place. In many ways 
the history of the gradual enlargement of the establishment 
reflects the general history of the nineteenth century in 
Botany and its allied sciences and arts. In the early years 
of the past century, when Botany consisted only of the study 
of the external characters of plants, their classification, and 
the investigation and cataloguing of the floras of the different 
regions of the world, the Royal Botanic Gardens of Ceylon 
were occupied principally with the collection and descrip- 
tion of the wild plants of the Island. Towards the middle 
of the century began the rise of Economic Botany, and the 
then Director did splendid service in the introduction and 
acclimatization of numerous useful and valuable plants from 
other parts o| the world, whilst not neglecting the study of 
the still very incompletely known vegetation of Ceylon 
itself. Later still, and with the rise of Vegetable Pathology, 
the fact began to be recognized, partly no doubt as the 
[Annals of the Royal Botanic Gardens, Peradeniya, Vol. I., Pt. I., June, 1901. 
49-01 
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