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[Page 2]
Introduction
This Essay is but a part of a larger design founded upon the following Principle.
That as the Territories now belonging to Britain possess every Climate from the Line to the Pole; they are thereby enabled to produce in perfection, every Plant which inhabits our Globe: And,
as the chief part of the British Imports from other Countries consists of vegetable Substances, which the British Dominions can be made to afford, in equal perfection:
It is therefore an Object worthy the attention, not only of Individuals, but of the Public, to translate to the Territories of Britain, the Plants, from which those vegetable Articles of Commerce are derived, which we import from Foreign Nations.
For this end, the first thing necessary, is to form accurate Catalogues of the Plants, thus to be translated, containing their Names and Botanical History, the Places where they are to be found, and the Countries to which they ought to be transported. This is perhaps the most important purpose, to which Botany can be applied; and few Sciences can promise any discovery or improvement of more public Emolument.
The principal design of the present Essay is to enumerate in a Catalogue of this kind, those plants growing in the East Indies, which afford Articles of Importation to Europe, and which neither grow naturally nor are cultivated in any other part of the World. The British West India Islands and particularly Jamaica, is the Country to which they are proposed to be transplanted.