PREFACE. eens 
HE following pages have been written in the hope 
that they may be used in the field and in the 
laboratory with specimens of our ordinary grasses in the 
hand. Most of the exercises involved demand exact study 
by means of a good hand-lens, a mode of investigation far 
too much neglected in modern teaching. The book is not 
intended to be a complete manual of grasses, but to be an 
account of our common native species, SO arranged that 
the student may learn how to closely observe and deal 
with the distinctive characters of these remarkable plants 
when such problems as the botanical analysis of a meadow 
or pasture, of hay, of weeds, or of “seed” grasses are 
presented, as well as when investigating questions of more 
abstract scientific nature. 
I have not hesitated, however, to introduce general 
statements on the biology and physiological peculiarities 
of grasses where such may serve the purpose of interesting 
the. reader in the wider botanical bearings of the subject, 
though several reasons may be urged against extending 
this part of the theme in a book intended to be portable, 
and of direct practical use to students in the field. 
I have pleasure in expressing my thanks to Mr R. H. 
Biffen for carefully testing the classification of “seeds” 
on pp. 185—174, and to him and to Mr Shipley for kindly 
~jooking over the proofs; also to Mr Lewton-Brain, who 
Shas tested the classification of leaf-sections put forward on 
ope: 72—82, and prepared the drawings for Figs. 21—28. 
_. That errors are entirely absent from such a work as 
his is perhaps too much to expect: I hope they are 
ew, and that readers will oblige me with any corrections 
