xlvi Proceedriif/s of fh Jlotaitical Society 



The greatest difficulty that a collector lias to contend with is the 

 drying his paper ; especially if the llowering season is a damp one. 

 In dry weather the best way is to lay it out in the sun on wooden 

 boards, and in countries where galleries are carried round the house, 

 this is easily done. You may sometimes avail yourself of a leaden 

 roof, or even a tiled one. The darker the colour of the paper, the 

 more quickly it dries in the sun, and on this account a slate- 

 coloured French paper is excellent. When there are no means of 

 spreading it in the sun, or the air is too damp, hang it over the 

 clothes-horse before a fire, or over strings stretched from wall to 

 wall of your room near the ceiling. The warmer it is applied to 

 the plants, the quicker they dry, the better they retain their colour, 

 and the more free they remain from mould and insects. 



Orchideous and most other monocotyledouous and succulent 

 plants, require to be first dipped into boiling water as far as up to 

 their flowers, to destroy their vitality. After this the paper must 

 be changed frequently, or they become mouldy. A tlat-iron is 

 sometimes useful with plants that are very retentive of life, but is 

 apt to make them brittle, and to destroy the form of the seed- 

 vessels. Some botanists dry their Carices in a box full of sand 

 with a canvas bottom, so as not to compress them too much. Some 

 put their succulents into tin boxes full of sand, and bake them. 

 Where a person devotes himself to one order of plants exclusively, 

 he may devise various means of preserving them best suited to their 

 peculiar character. 



Whatever method is followed, avoid above all things to pull 

 about your specimens till they are fit to put away into the her- 

 barium. It is the more necessary to give this caution, as most of 

 our English books recommend moving the plant itself to a fresh 

 sheet of paper every day, a practice which is sure to distort its shape 

 and break off the stamina and petals ; not to speak of the great 

 additional labour that it entails on the collector, and the necessity 

 of doing it with his own hands. Many of my most valuable speci- 

 mens were dried by men of colour, and other uneducated people, 

 thirty years ago or longer, with no other trouble to myself than 

 that of laying them as they came from the field into the sheets of 

 paper on which they are still lying. 



Should you not have time to examine them, or not have the 

 requisite books with you, where you collect them, you may do so at 

 your leisure at any future time by steeping them in boiling water, 

 which will quickly soften them and restore their forms, a process 

 familiar to us all at the tea-table. But whether you examine them 



