over, such references would not have proved of the smallest use to the Indian resident and traveller, for whom this work is specially intended.
And here I must caution botanists against an over-reliance upon the names attached to the Indian collections which have been distributed from Kew, first by myself, and latterly by the keeper of the herbarium, between 1855 and 1870. These collections originally comprised about half a million of specimens, which had been accumulating for upwards of thirty years, principally in the India House (where a great number were wholly destroyed b}' damp and vermin), at Kew, and at the Linnean Society, and consisted chiefly of the collections of Griftith, Falconer, Heifer, Royle, G. Thomson, T. Thomson and myself, Law, Stocks, Dalzell, and Gibson, together with the remainder of Wallich's, and latterly Wight's. From these, after arrangement, upwards of 380,000 specimens were distributed in sets to public and private museums in Europe, India, and America, every specimen bearing a ticket with the name of the locality and collector, and that of the plant, as far as it could be approximately determined. I have no reason to suppose that these collections contain more errors in nomenclature than do similar ones; but, as was explicitly stated when they were sent out, such names are not to be regarded as authoritative.
The area over which each species is distributed, is indicated by districts; these districts or geographical areas being botanical regions, which coincide in the main so closely with the well recognized territorial divisions of India, that a strict definition of them is unnecessary : an account of their limits and physical features will be found in the Introductory Essay to the Flora Indica, and its accompanying maps.
It has been a source of most sincere regret to me that a combination of circumstances has prevented the continuation of the Indian Flora upon the originally contemplated and more extended plan, under the joint authorship of my old friend and fellow-traveller. Dr. Thomson, and myself. Other duties in our respective services necessitated its postponement for a very long period, until indeed it became obvious that years were not left to us, even could we have commanded sufficient leisure, to finish so laborious an undertaking.
