SUMMARY AND ANALYSIS OF THE FLORA. 169 



Against these great reductions we have to place a few additions from recent 

 collections made by Pringle and Palmer in North Mexico, and S. Watson and Bernoulli 

 in Guatemala, but which came too late for insertion in the Supplement. 



A few words explanatory of the plan and scope of the following Table, in which 

 there are three primary divisions, will render it more easily comprehensible. The 

 first division or section includes the whole of the natural orders as circumscribed in 

 Bentham and Hooker's * Genera Plantar um ' ; those not represented within our limits 

 being separately numbered and printed in italics, and their general distribution* 

 given in the corresponding sections — thus showing at a glance what is wanting in 

 our flora. Below each natural order are the total numbers of admitted genera 

 and species found in Mexico and Central America, and the total numbers of them 

 endemic in or restricted to the whole area. The second division exhibits the nume- 

 rical distribution of the genera and species in the subdivisions of Mexico and 

 Central America, and the proportions endemic in Mexico, Guatemala, Honduras, and 

 Salvador collectively, and in Nicaragua, Costa Eica, and Panama collectively. It will 

 be understood that any discrepancy between the total of these two sums of endemic 

 species and the total in the first section is accounted for by the fact that some of the 

 endemic species are common to both areas. The third division shows the distribution 

 of the genera and species which occur within our limits and extend beyond them. It 

 is divided into two columns; the left-hand one referring to their extensions in 

 America, and the right-hand one to countries beyond America. In the American 

 column the total numbers of genera and species are given, followed by the numbers 

 restricted to America f ; and then the numbers extending respectively to western and 

 eastern North America, to South America, and to the West Indies. This was the 

 greatest degree of particularization admitted by the space ; but further details will be 

 found in succeeding tables. The extra- American column includes the rest of the world, 

 even the Galapagos J, which properly belong to the American floral region, to which 

 we have reckoned the Bermudas. " Widely " is employed to designate the distribution 

 of such genera and species as occur in two or more of the other large divisions of the 

 world. At first it was intended to attempt greater fulness in this column, especially in 

 relation to the northern and southern hemispheres, but contingencies of space, and the 

 desire to keep down the number of categories as low as was consistent with the main 

 object in view, led to this being abandoned. This is in a measure compensated for by 

 a series of paragraphs on the more interesting particulars of the general distribution of 

 certain natural orders and peculiar types of plants. 



* The broad features of the distribution of the other orders are embodied in a subsequent table of their 

 numerical sequence as to species in Mexico and Central America. 



t To avoid confusion this is expressed by "Am. only;" and the term endemic is only used in connection 

 with plants limited to Mexico and Central America. 



+ The connections between the flora of these islands and Mexico form the subject of a special paragraph. 



biol. centk.-Imek., Bot. Vol. IV., August 1887. z 



