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EARLY EUROPEAN RESEARCHES 
Osbeck’s notes on his plants collected near Canton are found 
scattered in his diary. He enumerates in the whole 244 
Chinese plants, giving their Linnaean names, often describing 
them. Sometimes he adds also the Chinese names according 
to the Canton dialect, but generally he sadly perverts the 
Chinese sounds. He says himself (II. 10) that it is possible 
that the Chinese, who gave him these names, have imposed 
upon him on many occasions. 
Linnaeus, when determining Osbeck’s Chinese collection 
seems to have been under the impression, that the habitats 
marked on the herbarium ’ tickets, as Daiies island, French 
island etc, referred to places of India, for in his Species 
plantarum, published 4 years before Osbeck’s narrative ap¬ 
peared, all plants gathered by the latter, figure, with a few 
exceptions, as Indian plants only. But as we have seen O. 
never visited India. He collected a few plants on the coast 
of Java, but the bulk of his collection was represented by 
Chinese specimens. I may quote a few instances. In Linnaeus’ 
Spec, plant, it is clearly stated, that Osbeck had gathered 
Mubus parvifolius, Cyperus Iria, Barleria cristata in India, 
whilst Osbeck had brought these plants from Canton. It 
seems that Linnaeus had a very confused idea with respect to 
the position of China and we cannot but think, that he consi¬ 
dered the latter name to be a synonym for India. He describes 
many plants not known from elsewhere than from China as 
natives of India. Thus he states himself, that his Rosa indicia, 
and Lager stroemia indica are Chinese plants. He describes his 
Daphne indica from specimens gathered by Osbeck at Canton, 
and this plant has, as far as I can conclude from the quotations 
in I). C. Prodr. XIY. 543, never been observed in India. On 
the other hand Bphaeranthus chinensis in his Spec, plant, figures 
as an Indian plant only. Compare D. C. Prodr. V. 371 “ cur 
chinensis cum ipse auctor ex India ortam dicat?” It is 
strange to say that none of the botanists who after Linnaeus 
have compiled general systematic works on Botany, as Lamarck, 
"Willdenow, Sprengel, Be Candolle, Kunth etc., ever ventured 
to refer, with resppct to Chinese plants directly to Osbeck’s 
book. They draw from Linnaeus and mention Osbeck’s Canton 
plants only in such cases for China, when the former had 
happened not to give India as habitat. But, as we shall see 
further on, by far the greatest part of the plants Linnaeus 
knew from China were collected by Osbeck near Canton. 
A considerable number of Osbeck’s Chinese specimens w r ere 
known previously from India, (Rumpliius, Rheede), but were 
