LIBRARY 

 NKW YORK 

 BOTANICAL 



GARDEN 



PREFACE 



My Catalogue of "Plants found in New Bedford and its vicinity," 

 published in the year 1860, was revised in 1891 under the title of 

 "Flora of New Bedford and the Shores of Buzzards Bay." The present 

 revision is made for the purpose of bringing the list of plants up to 

 date and of conforming the nomenclature to that used in Gray's New 

 Manual, 7th edition, which is in accord with the Vienna Rules, adopted 

 in 1905. The arrangement of a "Procession of the Flowers" is fol- 

 lowed as in the previous editions, and those plants of the Procession 

 growing spontaneously are also re-arranged under their appropriate 

 genera in a separate list, reference being made to both lists in the 

 index. The Howers of the same locality bloom from year to year with 

 surprising regularity as to time, excepting occasional variations of 

 about a week or ten days in the spring plants, so that a person desiring 

 to search for a particular plant learns the exact time it is in bloom and 

 does not make a fruitless search by going too early or too late. 



In preparing a Flora of a populous district it is somewhat difficult 

 to determine what plants are entitled to be recorded as growing spon- 

 taneously, and what are not, owing to garden escapes which are mostly 

 transient or mere waifs. The few plants of this class mentioned are 

 noted as being "escapes." There are here, in fact, two distinct floras, 

 one being the natural flora of the country, and the other the flora of 

 the city. In a city like New Bedford with ample grounds around 

 many of the dwellings in which a variety of foreign ornamental 

 trees and shrubs are cultivated, the flora is quite different from that 

 of the country and it would seem to be inexcusable not to notice it. 

 I have, therefore, noted in the Procession of the Flowers, the more 

 conspicuous of these cultivated plants, the same being printed in 

 italics. 



