FEIENDLY CKITICISM 393 



indispensable tools for scientific teaching, and for accuracy 

 in the use of them, and — striking personal note — ^the happy- 

 freedom with which two friends could speak their minds to 

 each other. 



Many thanks for the perusal of the enclosed, which 1 

 hke very much indeed — I have made a few pencil suggestions. 



The term systematic Botany is a bad one, but there is 

 no better in ordinary use ; it hence wants a little amphfying 

 upon to show that that branch is more than classification. 

 Morphological is the right, in contradistinction to Physio- 

 logical, but not adapted to your purpose. Few people 

 appreciate the fact that Syst. Bot. is the exposition of the 

 laws upon which plants are formed as well as classified 

 naturally — somehow they do not. 



Have you read Huxley on Methods in Nat. Hist. ? ^ 

 How do you Hke it ? I very much. 



My pencil remarks on your sheets are only suggestions. 

 I Hke the whole thing very much. 



December 12, 1854. 



My deak Henslow, — The enclosed seems very expHcit 

 and clear ; I have no suggestions to offer but a very few verbal 

 ones. Would it not be as well to put all the technical 

 terms in italics, it seems to give them weight ? Under 

 Flowers, I have put a pencil through * through arrest of 

 development ' — as I think it is rather questionable and at 

 any rate will be canvassed. Can we say that the Papa- 

 veraceae, having 4 petals and only 2 sepals, is through an 

 arrest ? this order being formed on a binary plan quite 

 as normally as other Dicots are on a quinary. If we hold 

 this to be an arrest of development, we must also consider 

 the Monocots to be ternary through arrest — or reason in 

 a circle. The fact is we call 5 the normal number, simply 

 because it is prevalent : and by the same token 5 being 

 prevalent in phaenogams as a whole, the Monocots which 

 are in the minority are as much entitled to be considered 

 arrests, as are Papaveraceae. 



Under Gymnosperms, — * an unfolded scale ' is very am- 

 biguous, the said scale never was folded ; but if you say 



1 On the Educational Value of the Natural History Sciences. An address 

 delivered on July 12, 1854. 



