^£W YORK. 

 BOTANlCAt- 



PREFACE 



This book has been written with the view of helping 

 those non-professional lovers of " Nature Study " who 

 are really interested in the mystery of Plant-life. 



During the first few years of my experience as a 

 teacher in Glasgow, I followed, in my lectures, the 

 ordinary botanical lines ; but in course of time it be- 

 came evident that, for many of my students, these 

 formal lines were not at all suitable. I have, therefore, 

 of late years, endeavoured, in all popular classes, to 

 follow a different plan, and, as far as possible, to do 

 wi4:hout technical terms. 



After all, few students have the intention of be- 

 coming professors of botany ; though they may all 

 be promising naturalists, and quite capable of doing 

 very valuable service to science, when they have 

 once conquered the initial difficulties. I have been 

 much encouraged in my attempt by discovering that 

 in Germany there is a decided tendency towards the 

 disuse of all but necessary technical terms. In Eng- 

 land, the terminology of Botany is fast becoming a sort 

 of Chinese alphabet, which will require so much time 

 2^ to master, that nothing of a lifetime will be left in which 

 •^to use it in the study of Nature. 



^ All students of plant-life, and especially those 



^^engaged as teachers in our elementary or higher 



^schools, whose time is exceedingly limited, are appalled 



at botanical language. Too often they obtain the 



