PREFACE +N 
Most of the redrawn illustrations (not microscopical) from 
various European sources_are by Mr. Fischer.. Most of the 
microscopical ones (and a number of figures from nature) are 
by Dr. J. W. Folsom of the University of Illinois, and many 
of both classes are by Mr. Mathews. Thanks are due to 
Professor J. M. Holzinger of the Winona (Minn.) State 
Normal School, to Professor L. Murbach of the Detroit High 
School, and to Mr. I. 8S. Cutter of Lincoln, Nebraska, for 
their many discriminating criticisms of the proof of Parts I 
and II. Mr. Samuel F. Tower of the Boston English High 
School, Professor Charles V. Piper of the Washington State 
Agricultural College, and Dr. Rodney H. True, Lecturer on 
Botany at Harvard University, have all read the whole or 
large portions of Part I and given valuable suggestions. 
Professor W. F. Ganong, of Smith College, has read and 
criticised Part II. | 
The chapters on spore-plants, exeepting a small amount of 
matter retained from the Hlements of Botany, are entirely the 
work of Mr. A. B. Seymour of the Cryptogamic Herbarium of 
Harvard University. 
The author has attempted to steer a middle course between 
the advocates of the out-of-door school and of the histological 
school of botany teaching. He has endeavored never to use a 
technical term where he could dispense with it, and on the 
other hand, not to become inexact by shunning necessary 
terms. In deciding questions of this sort, a priori reasoning 
is of little value; one must ascertain by repeated trials how 
much of a technical vocabulary the average beginner in botany 
can profitably master. The teacher who has discovered that 
not one of the boys in a division of thirty-six pupils knows 
that his own desk-top is of cherry wood may well hesitate 
about beginning his botany teaching with a discourse on cen- 
trospheres and karyokinesis. It has been assumed throughout 
this book that, other things being equal, the knowledge is of 
