Loudon, the English horticultural authority, says in his _Encyclopædia of Gardening_ (1835) that “some of the finest flowers of British gardens are natives of South America, especially annuals.” He mentions the dahlia—by the obsolete name of Georgina; the Marvel of Peru (Mirabilia) the Calceolaria and the Schizanthus, adding that “beautiful shrubs are not less numerous, but they are generally inmates of greenhouses.” Since Loudon wrote Brazil, as other parts of South and Central America, has been the happy hunting ground of plant explorers, and the gardens of Europe and North America have been beautified to an extent of which that devoted horticulturist never dreamed. The tale of the indebtedness of the gardens of less fortunate climes to South America in general and Brazil in particular for plants and shrubs, both ornamental and of economic value, would occupy a large volume; the extent of the debt is no less great than general ignorance of it. Practically nothing is known of early attempts to introduce Brazilian plants, for they were failures, and failures they remained for two and a half centuries after South America was discovered. The science of botany and art of gardening were alike in primitive stages until the latter part of the eighteenth century, and, whilst South American plants were known by their local names, means for their successful transportation had not been found; nor, in the rare cases of their surviving long journeys by sailing boat, was successful cultivation of these exotics known. If, as is possible, there are yet in herbariums in Portugal any plants which the early colonists sent home, no printed record of them seems to exist. It was not until the second decade of the nineteenth century that any serious attempts were made to reveal to the world the richness of Brazilian flora, and only within recent years that anything like a comprehensive account of it has been published: as far back as 1648 Willem Piso and Georg Marcgrav published in Amsterdam a large folio volume containing spirited woodcuts carefully coloured by hand of Brazilian flowers, shrubs, fishes, birds, reptiles, etc., but this was a natural history rather than a botanical book. Both these pioneers are commemorated in _Pisonia_ and _Marcgravia_, species of which are still in cultivation. In 1820 three scientific works dealing with Brazilian flora appeared. Mikan’s _Delectus floræ ... brasiliensis_ was issued in Vienna: Raddi’s _Di alcune specie nuove del Brasile_ and his _Quarante piante nuove de Brasile_, were issued in quarto volumes in Modena. Four years later St. Hilaire published in Paris his _Histoire des Plantes_ of Brazil and Paraguay; between 1827 and 1831 J. E. Pohl’s _Plantarum Brasilæ icones_ appeared in two folio volumes in Vienna. Other floras of Brazil, notably that of Martius, 1837–40, came out at intervals, and by the end of the century the plant life of Brazil was well covered by scientific publications.