PREFACE. 



Among the numerous useful and interesting objects of 

 natural history discovered on the vast extent of the Ne\T 

 Continent, none claim our attention in a higher degree 

 than the vegetable productions of North America. Her 

 forests produce an endless variety of useful and stately 

 timber trees ; her woods and hedges the most ornamen- 

 tal flowering shrubs, so much admired in our pleasure 

 grounds ; and her fields and meadows a number of ex- 

 ceedingly handsome and singular flowers (many of them 

 possessing valuable medicinal virtues), different from 

 those of other countries. All these are more or less capa- 

 ble of being adapted to an European climate, and the 

 greater part of easy cultivation and quick growth ; 

 which circumstances have given thern, with much pro- 

 priety, the first rank in ornamental gardening. 



A country so highly abundant in all the objects of my 

 favourite pursuits, excited in me, at an early period of 

 life, a Sc-ong desire to visit it, and to observe in their 

 natural soil and climate the plants which I then knew ; 

 and to make such discoveries as circumstances might 

 throw in my way. This plan I carried into executioii 

 in the year 1799 ; when I left Dresden, the place where 

 I had received my education, and embarked for Balti- 



