PART THIRD. 



SYSTEMATIC BOTANY. 

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CHAPTER I. 



OF THE CLASSIFICATION OF PLANTS. 



858. Systematic botany relates to the arrangement of plants into 

 groups and families, according to their characters, for the purpose of 

 facilitating the study of their names, affinities, habits, history, proper- 

 ties and uses. 



859. In this department, the principles of Structural and Physiological Botany 

 are applied and brought into practical use in the discrimination of the different 

 groups, and the limitation of their characters. Besides the immediate uses of Sys- 

 tematic Botany in the determination of species and kinds, as above stated, it ac- 

 complishes 



860. Another purpose of still higher import. It aids us in 

 studying plants as related to each other, and constituting one great and 

 glorious system. It shows us the Almighty Creator at once employed 

 in the minutest details and upon the boundless whole, equally attentive 

 to the perfection of the individual in itself, and to the completeness of 

 the grand system, of which it forms a necessary part. 



861. The subject op great extent. The study of classification introduces the 

 botanist into an extensive field of inquiry. The subjects of his research meet him at 

 every step. They clothe the hill and plain, the mountain and valley. They spring 

 up in the hedges and by the way side. They border the streams and lakes and 

 sprinkle over their surfaces ; they stand assembled in vast forests, and cover with 

 verdure even the depths of the ocean. Now, with each individual of this vast king- 

 dom the botanist proposes to acquaint himself, so that he shall be able readily to 

 recognize its name, and all that is either instructive, interesting, or useful concern- 

 ing it, whenever and wherever it is presented to his view. 



862. The wrong way to study. Now it is obvious that if the student should 

 attempt the accomplishment of this labor by studying each and every individual 

 plant in detail, whether with or without the aid of books, the longest life would 

 scarcely suffice him for making a good beginning. But such an attempt would be 

 as unnecessary as fruitless. The Author of Nature has grouped these myriads of 

 Individuals into 



