Dr. Hooker on American Botany. 121 



ly the difficulty of the task in which I have engaged. The 

 want of books, the want of opportunities for examining living 

 collections or good herbaria, the want of coadjutors, have all 

 served to render my task arduous, and to multiply its imper- 

 fections." Nevertheless, there are many new species, de- 

 scribed with great care and fidelity, and the grasses, which are 

 accompanied with some neat plates, have particularly at- 

 tracted the author's attention. There are several beautiful 

 novel species, and some newly established genera. We have 

 received of this work to the 6'th No. of the 2d volume, which 

 includes so far as the class Monoccia ; and we are informed 

 by Mr. Elliott, that another number will complete the Sketch. 

 This we regret, as the work cannot thus take in the Crypto- 

 gamia ; and we consider Mr. Elliott's talent for minute 

 description admirably calculated for such plants as that class 

 embraces. No man seems to be more strongly impressed 

 with the value of the study of natural history than Mr. 

 Elliott. " It has been, for many years, 1 '' says he, " the oc- 

 cupation of my leisure moments ; it is a merited tribute to 

 say, that it has lightened for me many a heavy, and smooth- 

 ed many a rugged hour; that beguiled by its charms, I have 

 found no road rough or difficult, no journey tedious, no 

 country desolate or barren. In solitude never solitary, in a 

 desert never without employment. I have found it a relief 

 from the languor of idleness, the pressure of business, and 

 from the unavoidable calamities of life. 11 * 



We come now to the agreeable employment of mentioning 

 a very important work, both on account of the extended na- 

 ture of the publication, and of the manner in which it has 

 been executed ; we allude to the " Genera of North Ameri- 

 can Plants, and a Catalogue of its Species to the year 1817, 

 by Thomas Nuttall" in 2 vols. 12mo. printed at Philadelphia. 

 Mr. Nuttall is an Englishman by birth, and a native of York- 

 shire; but he visited North America at an early age, and is 

 now domiciliated in that country. His love of botany and 

 mineralogy is exceedingly great, and a personal acquaintance, 

 which his late visit to this country has enabled us to have 

 the pleasure of forming, has only served to increase the es- 



* Sec Elliott's address to the Literary and Philosophical Society of South 

 Carolina, delivered at Charleston, and puhlished there in 1814-. 



