SIGNS, ETC. 369 



such sections are followed by a substantive name, they are 

 equivalent to subgenera. 1 Ex. Phacelia, Juss., 1. Euphacelia, 

 i. e. the true or typical Phacelia ; 2. Cosmanthus, Gray, &c. 

 Sections next in rank to these are marked with asterisks, * for 

 the first, * * for the second, * * * for the third one of the same 

 rank. Divisions of these have the *- prefixed ; and so on in the 

 same way. Still farther subdivisions may be marked by the 

 small letters of the alphabet consecutively, a, b, c. When capital 

 letters are used for division marks, it is mostly for those of a 

 high grade. 



7G8. Floras, Monographs, &c. A systematic work describing 

 in proper order the plants of a country or district is generally 

 called a Flora. A Flora of a small district takes the diminutive 

 name of a Florida. A universal work of the kind when it ex- 

 tends to the species is a System, Systema Vegetabilium or Sy sterna 

 lleyni Vegetabilis. The latest completed Systema Vegetabilium 

 is that of Sprengel (1825-1828), in five octavo volumes, on 

 a very condensed plan. A compendious Flora or S3'stema is 

 often termed a Prodromus, literally meaning a forerunner or 

 preliminary work. But, as even this is more than most bot- 

 anists are able to complete, the name of Prodromus is now 

 applied to works which are not intended to precede fuller ones 

 by the same author. The principal work of this kind is the Pro- 

 dromus Syst. Nat. Regni Vegetabilis, commenced by DeCandolle 

 in the j*ear 1824, continued b} r his son Alphonse DeCandolle 

 (aided by various botanists) to its close in 1873, down to vol. 

 xvii., or essentially twenty very compact octavo volumes, these 

 carrying the work only through the great class of Dicotyledones. 

 But the publication of the monocotyledonous orders has com- 

 menced in a series of Monographs (Monographic Phanerogam- 

 arum). A Monograph is a systematic account of all the species 

 of a genus, order, or other detached group. 



769. Specimens of botanical characters and descriptions, cita- 

 tions, &c., illustrating this chapter, might be given here. But, 

 for those in Latin, the classical works of DeCandolle and others, 

 and for the genera those of Jussieu, Endlicher, Bentham and 

 Hooker, may be taken as models. In English, those of the 

 latter authors, and in the United States the better-known 

 writings of the present author, especially the later ones, may 

 be referred to. 



1 DeCandolle in the Prodromus employed the word Sect. (Sectio) for 

 what answers to subgenus or at least to the highest grade of sections ; then 

 1, 2, &e., for the next grade below subgenus ; and then the asterisk, and 

 other marks. 



24 



