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Fr. Decooman who succeeded Becquaert as an entomologist, was appointed Director of the Museum after the war. He did not belong to the same Society or Order as his predecessors. He was a member of a Belgian Order. He had come from Vietnam (French Indo-China) where he had spent some 40 years. As a missionary in remote areas, he spent his free time collecting insects. He was a trained entomologist, specializing in the Scaritidae family. He first directed his attention to reorganizing the museum that had suffered neglect by his predecessor and had thousands of insects mounted from collections still lying unpacked in the drawers. He also looked for manuscripts which could be published. At that time, I was part-time in charge of the Botany Section of the Museum, Fr. Decooman approached me and suggested that I should prepare Belval's manuscript as well as one of my own: Trees and Shrubs of Shanghai for publishing. I was working on these two projects when I met the young Hsu Pin-shen, already a keen botanist, now Professor and President of the Botany Department in Shanghai and in all China. We worked together on the Trees and Shrubs of Shanghai; that was in 1950-52. Needless to say, the events that followed did not allow the publication of these two manuscripts. But between Hsu Pin-shen and myself, a lasting friendship had developed which was delightfully revived when Prof. Hsu kindly invited me to spend a month with him at Fudan University.
The purpose of my visit to Shanghai is actually to update not exactly Belval's manuscript but one based on it; one more complete and developed, written by my colleague Paul August and to which I contributed as we were working in collaboration. Besides updating the manuscript, I must also include the section on the Pteridophytes which was lacking in both manuscripts. To this effect, I was invited by Prof. Zhan Sho-Ling and the municipality of Shanghai to spend six months here, in this country which was for 18 years my country of adoption. The project is sponsored by the University of Melbourne and funded by The Australia-China Council. My work so far has been made easy, thanks to the great help given to me by the Museum of Natural History and to the friendly collaboration of the office staff.
I must thank Prof. Hsu and my colleagues at the Botany Department for the invaluable help they have been giving me. But their acceptance of an old foreigner among the staff, the attention and friendship they have shown to me will be valued much more and will last as long as I live.