WCP3854

[1]

Old Orchard,

Broadstone,

Wimborne.

June 14th 1909¹

L[ieutenan]t. Col[onel]. D[avid]. Prain², F.R.S &c.

Dear Sir

Sir W.T. Thiselton Dyer³ tells me, that he has written to you asking you if you can furnish me with certain statistics of plant distribution which I should wish to have if available.

Since he wrote, Sir J[oseph]. Hooker⁴ has kindly sent me his most valuable "Sketch of the Flora of British India" which contains many such data as I want.

To supplement that, I should much [2] like to have the following: —

(1) An estimate, however roughly approximate, of the number of species of Flowering Plants in the "Malay Archipelago" — or in the Dutch possessions, which latter the botanists at Buitenzorgh may possibly have made.

(2) Also an estimate of the same total number of sp[ecies]. in Java which they must almost certainly know approximately & have perhaps published.

(3) Any approximate estimate of the species in Brazil,⁵ or in Peru to serve as an ^South American comparison of plant-productiveness. These may possibly have been made [3] by some German botanists.

This is really all I care about now, — and even the roughests estimates, founded on the species actually described in any of the areas or any parts of them, will be sufficient for my purpose.

Pray do not trouble to do more than send me such figures as may have been actually given, for any portions of the countries named, or for which bear upon the subject of comparative richness.

Yours very truly | Alfred R. Wallace [signature]

[4]⁶Miquel⁷in Flor[a van]. Nederl[andsch]. Ind[ie]. III (1859) p.773 gives 9118 as the number of Phanerogams then known or described from "India aquose" which means the Malay Archipelago. The figures is are no doubt very much below the actual number.

I cannot find a census of the plants of Java. Dr. S. Koordirs⁸[sic] in Leiden might be able to help Mr. Wallace.

The estimate for Brazil (1906) is 22767; but this includes only the plants enumerated in the Flora Brasiliensis, and the figures taken from the early volumes must be short of the true numbers a long way. As to Peru not even an approximate estimate can be given.

16.6.09 O[tto].S[tapf].