¥i PRELIMINARY OBSERVATIONS. 
portunities of that governmental expedition, Itis well known, that no 
botanist or naturalist accompanied those travellers; although our or- 
nithology might have been enriched by some new species of birds, 
or some interesting facts relative to the habits and migrations of 
known species, had the humble and entreating offer of the lamented 
Wilson,* to accompany the expedition, been accepted. It is neither 
my intention, nor my province, in this place, to make any animad- 
-_yersions on the direction of that great undertaking : but I cannot for- 
bear to remark, that from the discoveries made by a botanical exa- 
mination of the few plants brought by captain Lewis, we are war- 
ranted in the belief, that a very spendid harvest might have been 
reaped, had any competent botanist accompanied the party. I need 
only mention, in proof of this, the discovery of the plant which yields 
the bread-root of the Indians. 
The Opopanok, the Mockshauw, the wild-potatoe, and the hog-potatoe,+ 
are yet entirely unknown; at least the identical plants bearing these 
names, are not yet ascertained. They are, undoubtedly, native vege- 
tables; and it was formerly supposed that some one or two of them, 
* For an affecting account of the transaction here alluded to, I beg leaye to refer to 
the masterly biographical sketch of his friend, by Juin Ord, Esq. prefixed to the tenth 
volume of Wilson’s Ornithology, which was edited by this zealous naturalist, 
{1 am aware that the convolvulus panduratus has been called hog-potatoe, but whether 
it is really the plant so commonly recognised by that name formerly, is somewhat pro- 
blematical. 7 : 
2 
