14 PLAN OF THE CATALOGUE. 



III. Synonyms are printed in Italics. 



IV. The principle underlying the arrangement and nomen- 

 clature of the Catalogue is a very simple one, more practical 

 than theoretical. It is this : to follow in these respects some 

 manual or other work of high authority, regardless of any 

 fancy or preference of the authors. It seems hardly necessary 

 to state to any one of practical experience, that the office of a 

 local Flora, or of any similar work designed fully as much for 

 the public generally as for scientists, is not to serve as a nomen- 

 clator, or to present an opportunity for the author to display his 

 fads to his own satisfaction and the confusion of the reader, 

 but rather to be a help and an aid to a better knowledge 

 of the plants of any given region. Unless descriptions are 

 added, so that such a catalogue is in reality a manual in itself, 

 reference must be made to some well known work or handbook. 

 Such being the case, the authors have felt obliged to adopt 

 some such standard as a guide and basis for the arrangement 

 and nomenclature of the Catalogue,^ giving only such synonyms 

 as in their judgment may serve some useful purpose of identifi- 

 cation or of information, and making such corrections only as 

 do not interfere with the system of the guide adopted. 



In nomenclature and arrangement, the sixth (revised) edition 

 of Graj'^'s Manual by Watson and Coulter is followed for the 

 Phanerogams (Flowering Plants) ; for the Pteridophyta (Vascu- 

 lar Cryptogams), and for the Hepaticae. Dr. Carl Warnstorf's 

 articles on the North American Sphagna, in Vol. XV. (1890) 

 of the Botanical Gazette, are mainly followed for Sphagnum; 

 while Lesquereux and James's "Mosses of North America" is 

 followed for the remainder of the Mosses. Tuckerman's works 

 are followed as far as possible for the Lichens, and Farlow's 

 "Marine Algae of New England," with some marked changes 



1 As, however, the subject of botanical nomenclature has been given 

 undue prominence of late by some of our American botanists among others, 

 it has seemed better to the authors to discuss this subject at more length in 

 the Introduction. Had this not been done, it might be asked why the 

 rules of the so called Rochester and Madison Codes were not followed 

 as a standard, — an intentional omission for which there is more than ample 

 justification. 



