45 



danger from its corrupt influences, have been spent amid woods 



and fields in search of our native plants. 



" Rura mihi et rigui placeant in vallibus amnes, 

 Flumina amem silvasque inglorius." 



Even when a botanist has become well acquainted with the 

 Flora of a district, there is always the pleasurable hope of still 

 finding something new to reward his industry ; and if he fail in 

 this, it is yet no small advantage to have an object to give an 

 interest to every walk, and to induce him to take the exercise so 

 conducive to health. But in truth, the field in which he carries 

 on his researches, if he looks closely into it, will never be 

 exhausted. It is surprising how novelties turn up from time to 

 time under the influence of some of those causes to which I have 

 already alluded, even in the best explored districts. This is in a 

 measure true with the higher orders of plants, but in respect of 

 the Cryptogamia, plants of lower organisation, there is hardly 

 any district in Great Britain that has been worked out so as to be 

 able to say what it yields. These obscure tribes off'er, no doubt, 

 some difliculty to the beginner, but they deserve to be considered 

 in their turn. If the student or the collector pass them over at 

 first, as in most cases he naturally would, at least let him not 

 think that there is nothing more for him to do, when he has 

 examined or collected all the larger and more showy plants ; or 

 that there is nothing left of any interest to arrest his attention, 

 or to be worth looking after. 



I leave it to those botanists who, like Mr. Broome, one of our 

 oldest members, have so thoroughly studied the Fungi, among 

 the lowest of all vegetable forms, to speak of the several species 

 of this large tribe found in the neighbourhood of Bath. I hope 

 he may one day make us acquainted with them, pointing out 

 their peculiarities of structure, the places and seasons in which 

 they most abound, and the need in which they stand of further 

 investigation. But should you doubt whether Mushrooms, 

 Toadstools, Puff"balls, and Moulds, and other similar productions, 



