View source for A Sketch of the Vegetation of the Swan River Colony

{{Short description|Book by John Lindley}}
[[Image:A Sketch of the Vegetation of the Swan River Colony - Frontispiece.jpg|thumb|right|Frontispiece to the publication in which ''A Sketch of the Vegetation of the Swan River Colony'' appeared]]
'''"A Sketch of the Vegetation of the Swan River Colony"''', also known by its standard botanical abbreviation '''''Sketch Veg. Swan R.''''',<ref name="IPNI 992-2">{{cite web | url = http://www.ipni.org/ipni/idPublicationSearch.do?id=992-2 | title = Appendix to the first Twenty Three Volumes of Edward's Botanical Register ... A Sketch of the Vegetation of the Swan River Colony... London | work = [[International Plant Names Index]] (IPNI) | access-date = 2007-09-06}}</ref> is an 1839 article by [[John Lindley]] on the flora of the [[Swan River Colony]]. Nearly 300 new species were published in it, many of which are still current.
It appeared as Part Three of ''Appendix to the first twenty three volumes of Edward's Botanical Register'', the first two parts being indices of previous volumes of ''[[Edwards's Botanical Register]]'', of which Lindley was editor. It contained 58 pages, issued in three parts. Pages 1 to 16 were issued on 1 November 1839; pages 17 to 32 on 1 December 1839; and the remaining 26 pages on 1 January 1840.<ref name="IPNI 992-2"/> It also contained four [[woodcut]]s based on sketches by Lindley, and nine hand-coloured [[lithograph]]ic plates, the artist and lithographer of which are unacknowledged and are now unknown. According to Helen Hewson, the woodcuts are of high quality, but the plates "do not measure up to the standard of contemporary illustration".<ref name="Hewson 1999">{{cite book | first = Helen | last = Hewson | year = 1999 | title = Australia: 300 years of botanical illustration | publisher = CSIRO Publishing | location = Collingwood, Victoria | isbn = 0-643-06366-8}}</ref>
"A Sketch of the Vegetation of the Swan River Colony" represents only the second attempt to provide a flora for the colony, the first being [[Stephan Endlicher]]'s  1837 ''[[Enumeratio plantarum quas in Novae Hollandiae ora austro-occidentali ad fluvium Cygnorum et in sinu Regis Georgii collegit Carolus Liber Baro de Hügel|Enumeratio plantarum]]'', a [[Latin]] work of which only one installment was published.<ref name="IPNI 4363-2">{{cite web | url = http://www.ipni.org/ipni/idPublicationSearch.do?id=4363-2 | title = Enumeratio Plantarum quas in Novae Hollandiae ora austro-occidentali ... de Hügel | work = [[International Plant Names Index]] (IPNI) | access-date = 2007-09-06}}</ref><ref name="Lindley 1839">{{A Sketch of the Vegetation of the Swan River Colony}}</ref> Thus there were at the time a great many undescribed species awaiting publication — speaking of the (now defunct) order Stylidaceae, Lindley remarks "In [[Robert Brown (botanist, born 1773)|Brown]]'s [[Prodromus Florae Novae Hollandiae et Insulae Van Diemen|prodromus]] forty-six species only are named for all New Holland... but I possess from Swan River alone at least forty well marked species, and there are some of Baron Hugel's with which I am unacquainted".<ref name="Lindley 1839"/> Working primarily from the collections of [[James Drummond (botanist)|James Drummond]], Lindley was able to publish around 280 new taxa, many of which remain current.
==References==
{{wikisource|Edwards's Botanical Register/Appendix to the First Twenty-three Volumes/A Sketch of the Vegetation of the Swan River Colony}}
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[[Category:1839 non-fiction books]]
[[Category:Books about Western Australia]]
[[Category:Books about Australian natural history]]
[[Category:Florae (publication)]]
[[Category:Botany in Western Australia]]
[[Category:1830s in science]]