The Trees, Shrubs and Woody Climbers of the Bombay Presidency
1902; Nature Portfolio; Volume: 67; Issue: 1729 Linguagem: Inglês
10.1038/067148a0
ISSN1476-4687
Tópico(s)Ethnobotanical and Medicinal Plants Studies
ResumoWHEN Sir Joseph Hooker's “Flora of British India,” now completed, was undertaken, one of its main objects was stated to be to furnish a basis on which local floras could be constructed. India is so vast, its climatic features are so varied, the economic requirements of its several provinces so diverse, that a general work like that of Hooker needs to be supplemented by local floras in which the special requirements of particular districts can be fulfilled. There is gratifying evidence to show that these requirements are in course of being supplied. There is, for instance, the a Forest Flora of the North-West, by Sir Dietrich Brandis; Sir George King is engaged on the “Flora of the Malay Peninsula”; the “Flora of Ceylon” was completed by the late Dr. Trimen; and General Collett's book on the plants of the Simla district has just been published. We might cite many similar works from the pens of Prain, Clarke, Duthie, Watt, Kurz and others, but enough has been said to show that Sir Joseph Hooker's aim is in process of fulfilment, and that the splendid botanical heritage handed down to us by Roxburgh, Wallich, Wight, Griffith and others is in na danger of being squandered, but is being utilised and extended by the labours of the present race of botanists. When we bring to mind the fact that instruction in botany, at any rate in systematic botany, no longer forms part of the curriculum in the education of medical students, and that complaints have been made as to the lack of interest felt in the subject by the majority of forest officers, this evidence of substantial progress may at least be adduced as a set-off.
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