250 Mr. Anperson’s Monograph of the Genus Paonia. 
have described Ponies with precision after Linné, and their de- 
scriptions are excellent as far as they go; but the accession of new 
species lately discovered, and as yet but imperfectly described, to- 
gether with the necessity of a thorough revision of those that were 
formerly known, rendered some attempt like the present requi- 
site. If it shall be found to possess any merit, it is not to me, 
but to my much esteemed friend Joseph Sabine, Esq. F. R.S., &c. 
that it is to be ascribed: that gentleman for several years has 
collected with indefatigable pains all the P:eonies he could dis- 
cover both from public and private gardens. Having at length 
assembled upwards of seventy plants under different names in his 
garden at North Mimms, he began, by comparing them together, 
to produce order out of confusion. It was at his particular invi- 
tation that I first attempted to describe them ; and it has been 
by the assistance of his information that I have been enabled to 
proceed in the unde taking. I have, therefore, to avoid the neces- 
sity for reiterated acknowledgements, taken the liberty of employ- 
ing the plural number, as including ae in the composition of 
the following account. 
+ Ido not enter into any examination of the general character, - 
farther than to repeat what has been hinted by others; that the 
“genus properly belongs to Polyandria Trigynia, not only because 
the species more generally exhibit three pistilla than any other 
number, but also because this is its most natural position: it 
should stand, in my opinion, between Aconitum and Homalium in 
the factitious arrangement. The germina tomentosa, will now be 
expunged from the natural character, there being two species — 
with smooth germens. 
The descriptions are made out from an actual examination of 
each living plant; and it affords no. small satisfaction to say, that 
very few if any of the plants taken, notice of up to.the present 
time remain unaccounted for: a few, indeed, which appear to be 
questionable, 
