species which grow in Lower Louisiana and in the two Floridas. In the second 

 place I have described and figured some trees that are deficient in the flowers and 

 in the fruits. Had circumstances permitted, I would have returned to the United 

 States, and, in a new edition, have corrected the errors, and filled up the omissions. 

 I would thus have been able to present to the American nation a work worthy of 

 her great name ; but now that I have arrived at a very advanced age, nearly 83 

 years, I can do nothing more, in this respect, than to express my regrets and the 

 hope that some native arboriculturist may complete ray researches on the plan 

 which I have adopted. The publication of such a work would be attended with 

 much benefit to the country, and afibrd particular honor to him who would under- 

 take it." 



Since the appearance of his great work, Michaux has devoted all his attention 

 to his favorite pursuits — the cultivation and propagation of trees presenting a 

 special object of public utility. Intrusted with the administration of a large 

 estate belonging to the Central Society of Agriculture, experimenting largely in 

 sylviculture on the extensive plantations of Mr. Delamarre, and owning himself a 

 country place near Pontoise, he never ceased, until his death, to be actively em- 

 ployed in experiments on arboriculture, either suggested by himself or others. 



Michaux had retained in this country a few correspondents, who sent him occa- 

 sionally new supplies of seeds, and, through a letter furnished by one of these 

 gentlemen, I had the gratification to become acquainted with him in the autumn 

 of 1824. 



When living in Baltimore, from 1816 to 1824, I formed an intimacy with a 

 French gentleman of the name of Leroy, who had known Michaux iu this 

 country, and had been since in correspondence with him. This Mr. Leroy, who 

 was himself an excellent arboriculturist, having been earnestly solicited by his 

 friend to send him all the seeds and young trees which he could procure in the 

 vicinity of Baltimore, applied to me, as a fellow botanist, to assist him in this 

 undertaking. We therefore went to work together in earnest during the autumn 

 of 1819, rambling into the woods with a negro boy, climbing and beating Oaks, 

 Maples, and Hickory-trees ; uprooting the shrubs and young trees that fell in our 

 way, and collecting seeds of every sort. The result of our campaign filled up seve- 

 ral large boxes, which were forwarded to Michaux iu the early part of the winter. 



When I visited Europe in 1824, Mr. Leroy favored me with a letter of intro- 

 duction to his friend, recommending me as his colaborer in the collections which 

 had been forwarded to him from Baltimore some years previous. This letter did 

 not fail insuring to me a hearty welcome at the hands of Mr. Michaux. I saw 

 him frequently, and breakfasted with him at his winter quarters in I'aris, on the 

 place St. Michael, which was then a market for garden vegetables and fruits. We 

 seldom sat at the breakfast table without having previously made an inspection 

 through the stalls where fruits and vegetables were sold ; and he was pleased to 

 point out to me the rarest and most beautiful, with a passing notice on their 

 origin. 



Mr. Michaux was extremely desirous to show me in detail his fine nurseries, 

 especially those which coiitained his Maryland trees, to '^contemplate'''' the result 

 of the troubles and fatigues which they had cost me ; but the weather was so un- 

 favorable during the whole season that I could visit but one of them, which I 

 found wholly planted with Maryland Oaks, and covering an extensive plot of 

 ground. Though the young trees, then devoid of their foliage, had suffered 

 much the second year from the depredations of a herd of swine that had tres- 

 passed upon the grounds, they still appeared vigorous and promising, and are, I 

 suspect, the very same trees that are now (as I see by the Paris papers) adorn 



