WCP5552

[1]

Manaos, Rio Negro

11^th June. 1874

D^r Hooker C. B.¹

Dear Sir

I write in haste to inform you that I send to Pará² today a box of dried plants addressed to the Herbarium at Kew³ as with the two already sent.

The plants are from the rivers Mauhes, Abacaxis, & Madeira⁴. Among them are specimens of about a dozen species of small palms, Bactris & Geonoma⁵, Spruce’s⁶ ‘Palmae Amazonicae’⁷ is the only work on palms that I have with me except descriptions of species which I copied from Wallace’s Palms⁸, but these latter I find to be practically useless.

Hardly any of those dried seem to be described by Spruce, save one or two of the Geonomae (& even these do not agree very well with those which they approach most nearly) but I do not think that I would be justified in naming them till I can compare them with the descriptions & figures of Martius⁹. In the box are also stems of all the palms whose leaves are the collection, & spathes & spadices, some dried, others in spirits. The numbers on the labels refer to a [2]¹⁰ descriptive catalogue which I am making of each species as I collect it[.]

I am | yours respectfully | James W. H. Trail. [signature]