( 9 ) 
tea-planter (and he is certain to be the most obliging of men), there 
is in the dry air of the tea-house an ideal botanical atmosphere. And 
when none of these are available, there is still a very simple and not at 
all an expensive plan that can be adopted. This is to convert a mud 
or brick outhouse into a drying chamber. All openings require to be 
closed up save a small one (that probably will require to be made) near 
the floor-level, and another, also small (that probabl)^ already exists), 
about 4 or 5 feet up the wall and on the opposite side of the room 
from the other. The door must fit fairly tightly. A large chafing 
dish (such as one’s ‘ khansamah’ uses daily in the cook-house, and 
which is to be obtained in almost any bazar—if not obtainable a subs¬ 
titute is easily improvised) placed in the middle of the room with a 
charcoal fire lit in it completes the equipment. The door being shut, 
sufficient air passes from opening to opening to keep the fire alive, 
and yet not enough to prevent this fire from rendering all of air the 
room contains almost absolutely moistureless. Shelves on which to 
lay the bundles or rods to which to tie them can be easily fitted up, 
and with a room such as this at command one is quite independent 
of the weather. Where an outhouse is not available, it is not a very 
costly matter to build one of bricks, of mud, or of corrugated iron, 
where any of these materials are available ; where they are not, it is 
possible with care to dry one’s specimens in a similar hut with mud- 
plastered ekra walls and with a thatched roof. Such a house, how¬ 
ever may catch fire, and it is advisable to build it at some distance 
from one’s quarters and not to have all one’s drying paper in it at a 
time. The general plan of the drying house, whatever its material, 
is simplicity itself: ground space 6—lo feet square ; walls 6—7 feet 
high ; doorway the smallest compatible with the possibility of ingress ; 
lower opening 6 inches from the ground in any wall and 4 inches square; 
upper opening in wall opposite, 18 inches from the eaves and 6 inches 
square. It is, perhaps, advisable that neither opening be on the side 
exposed to the quarter whence the prevailing rainy season wind blows. 
When moving from place to place in the rainy season collecting 
is by no means so easy as at other times. One must then follow 
implicitly the method of repeated change of papers detailed first, and 
troublesome as it is to change papers at the close of a long wet day’s 
march, this trouble is really well repaid in the end. There are just a 
few things that it is well worth remembering, A few specimens well 
preserved are worth a whole hayrick of half-rotten material. Not 
that the collector, particularly when beginning work, should venture 
to decide as to what plants may be left uncollected. The true col¬ 
lector brings everything and leaves it entirely to the botanist who has 
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