NHD9

Two hundred and forty-one drawings in watercolour, pen-and-ink and pencil; 236 depicting Lepidoptera and 5 cryptogams from Java; bound in a volume measuring 21 by 14 inches.

These drawings were collected by Horsfield in Java between 1811and 1818. The drawings of mosses were probably made by himself, those of the insects by his local draughtsmen. The drawings of insects accompanied the specimens which he presented to the Company. They were used in preparing his 'Descriptive Catalogue of the Lepidopterous Insects in the Company's Museum', parts i and ii (1829) and for 'A Catalogue of the Lepidopterous Insects in the Museum of the Hon. East India Company', 2 vols. (London, 1857 and 1858-9) which he and his assistant Frederic Moore compfled together. The illustrations in the latter two volumes were made by J.O. Westwood from Horsfield's collection of drawings . The illustrations have been pasted into this album beside 59 of them.

The drawings are numbered 1-187 (some are duplicates) and are inscribed 'Java. Horsfield' whfle the Latin name of the subject is also given. The drawings 1638-42 are inscribed 'Drawings of Java Mosses'. Horsfield's botanical drawings were transferred to Kew in 1879. Unfortunately the working out of the botanical collections was entrusted to Robert Brown and the only result of all Horsfield's botanical research was Brown and Bennett's 'Plantae Javanicae Rariores' (1838-52).