James Cunningham (botanist)
James Cunningham | |
---|---|
Nationality | Scottish |
Occupation(s) | Botanist and surgeon |
James Cunningham (died 1709?) was a Scottish botanist and surgeon.
Biography
Cunningham, a Scotchman, went out in 1698 as surgeon to the factory established by the
The East India Company acknowledged his services by appointing him in 1704 second in council of the factory at Borneo, and in 1707 chief of Banjar.
Cunningham had been elected a fellow of the Royal Society in 1699, and his contributions to the ‘Philosophical Transactions’ are both numerous and important. The following may be mentioned: ‘An Account of a Voyage to Chusan in China’ (xxiii. 1201–1209; reprinted in vol. i. of Harris's ‘Voyages’), in which he was the first writer to give an accurate description of the tea plant; ‘Observations on the Weather, made in a Voyage to China,’ 1700 (xxiv. 1639); ‘A Register of the Wind and Weather at China, with the observations of the mercurial barometer at Chusan, from November 1700 to January 1702’ (xxiv. 1648). His account of the massacre at Pulo Condore (a copy of which is to be found in the Sloane MS. No. 3322, ff. 76–7) was afterwards inserted in the modern part of the ‘Universal History, (x. 154, edit. 1759). Many of his letters to Petiver are preserved in the Sloane MS. No. 3322, ff. 54–75; those to Sloane himself are in the same collection, No. 4041, ff. 317–36. He invariably spells his name ‘Cuninghame.’ Robert Brown has complimented Cunningham by calling after his name a species of the madder tribe.
References
This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Goodwin, Gordon (1888). "Cunningham, James (d.1709?)". In Stephen, Leslie (ed.). Dictionary of National Biography. Vol. 13. London: Smith, Elder & Co.