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[Page 23]
Translation was set on foot. Their Soils, Stations, and every thing relative to their History and Culture, would then require to be canvassed. A full prosecution of some Subjects relative to the Translation of Plants in general would be likewise requisite. The manner of preserving Seeds in a vegetating State, and the Management of Plants during long Voyages, the diversity of Climate in places of the same Latitude; the Rules to be observed in transplanting Plants from the Southern to the Northern Hemisphere and the causes of that difference of quality sometimes observable in the same Simple, produced in different Countries. These with a variety of other Subjects, which are not necessary to be considered here, would then deserve an extensive and accurate discussion.
2.
Except Metals, Gems, Earthen Ware, Musk and Amber grease, the whole of the European Importation from the East Indies, is nearly derived from the Plants which we have now inumerate; whose translation to the British Islands in America would probably turn so many branches in Trade into a quite different, but into a far more advantageous Channel for Britain. These Plants are as yet almost wholly confined to Asia. Many of them have indeed at different times ben brought from India, to live a wretched Life, or rather to be starved to death in European Greenhouses where they never can arrive at perfection, nor serve a better purpose than to satisfy the Eyes of Botanists. Our West India Islands are the places to which they ought to be taken, and then they would prove an inexhaustable source of National Wealth and National Grandeur.
3.
Jamaica is the Country we have particularly pointed out. For all the British Colonies, it seems to be the most proper for the first reception of Plants