What is Robert Fortune?
[[Image:RobertFortune.gif|thumb|right|200px|Robert Fortune.]] '''Robert Fortune''' (16 September 1812 – 13 April 1880) was a [[Scotland|Scottish]] [[botanist|plant expert]], [[plant collecting|plant hunter]] and traveller best known for introducing tea plants from [[China]] to [[India]]. ==Travels and introduction of plants to Europe== Fortune was born in Kelloe, [[Berwickshire]]. He was employed in the [[Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh]], and later in the garden of [[Royal Horticultural Society|Horticultural Society of London]] at [[Chiswick]]. In 1842 was sent out by the Society to collect plants in [[China]]. He brought back to [[Europe]] many new, exotic and beautiful flowers. His most famous achievement was the successful introduction of tea from China to India in 1848 on behalf of the [[British East India Company]]. Like some European travellers of that period, such as [[Walter Medhurst]], Fortune disguised himself as a Chinese merchant during several of his journeys into parts of China that were prohibited to him. Not only was Fortune's purchase of tea plants forbidden by the Chinese government of the time, but he was not permitted to travel more than one day from certain ports where Europeans were allowed to trade. Fortune travelled to some areas of China that had seldom been visited by Europeans, including remote areas of [[Fujian]], [[Guangdong]], and [[Jiangsu]] provinces. Fortune employed many different means to transport tea plants, seedlings, and other botanical discoveries, but he is most well known for his use of cases like small greenhouses called [[Wardian case]]s (as used by Nathaniel Bagshaw Ward) to keep the plants alive. With these cases Fortune introduced 20,000 tea plants and seedlings to the [[Darjeeling]] region of India. He also brought with him a group of trained Chinese tea workers to assist in the production of tea [[Leaf|leaves]]. Except for a few plants which survived in Indian gardens, most of the Chinese tea plants Fortune introduced to India died. The special growing methods