GOTTHILF HEINRICH ERNST MUHLENBERG. 63 



and to add to it N. S., till better information came from more 

 capable botanists." The cryptogamous plants are repre- 

 sented in this index by twenty-five genera with one hundred 

 and twenty-five species. The work, as its name implies, con- 

 sists merely of the enumeration of the species observed, with- 

 out description or indication of their habits or uses. A supple- 

 ment to this Index, presented to the American Philosophical 

 Society in September, 1796, and published in the fourth volume 

 of its Transactions, contained forty-four additional genera with 

 sixty-two species of phanerogams, of which nine were hitherto 

 unknown species of grasses ; while the cryptogams were further 

 represented by two hundred and twenty-six additional species, 

 belonging to twenty-nine genera. 



Muhlenberg perceived very early in his botanical studies 

 how great confusion was likely to arise if names were conferred 

 upon plants supposed to be new, without considering whether 

 they might not have been previously identified and named by 

 others. We have already described the painstaking care he 

 took in his own notes to find the correct names of his speci- 

 mens. While he was critical of the work of others, he was 

 always ready to recognise their merit, and to make allowance 

 for their imperfections. He wrote to Dr. Cutler of his work 

 on the Useful Plants of New England that, although the author 

 regarded it as immature, " it was of great use to me, and I was 

 very much pleased with it. Every beginning will be imperfect, 

 especially in a new country, and I have not yet read any botan- 

 ical work without errors. Even Linnaeus's works, which were 

 prepared with so much industry, are full of them." In another 

 place he wrote : " Herr Aiton,* in my opinion, makes too many 

 species out of varieties ; for instance, his asters and golden-rods. 

 We must expect such things when descriptions are made from 

 specimens taken from a garden instead of from their natural 

 habitats, where plants grow numerously and in various soils." 

 Other criticisms of similar tenor may be taken from his letters, 

 all made from the point of view of exactness in identification 

 and description. 



Freedom from self-glorification and from solicitude for the 

 recognition of his work are patent in all his writings and trans- 

 actions. When Dr. Barton announced, in 1791, his illustrated 



* In his Hortus Kewensis, 1789. 



