106 VEGETABLE GEOGRAPHY. 



plants.) Cadi, (prickly-pear tribe.) Portulacea, (purse-lanet tribe,) 

 emolient. Ficoidea ; ex. ice-plant. Onagra ; (willow-herb plants.) 

 Myoti ; ex. mystus. Melastoma. Salicarice. Rosacete ; (rose and 

 apple tribe.) Leguminosa, (pea tribe;) fruit legume. Terebintacece; 

 ex. sumach. Rhamni ; ex. buckthorn. 



CLASS 15. Dicotyledons, (stamens and pistils declinous, or on differ- 

 ent flowers.) Euphorbia; ex. spurge. Cucurbitacece, (melon-like 

 plants;) ex. water-melon, cucumber. Urticece ; ex. hop. Jlmenta- 

 cea ; ex. oak, willow. Conifera, cone-bearing trees 5 ex. pine, cedar. 



VEGETABLE GEOGRAPHY. 



Vegetables, considered with reference to their habitation and their 

 particular locality or station, is a science of much importance to the 

 general reader and observer, the natural philosopher and horticulturist, 

 and, in truth, to whole nations of people. Nothing can more enlarge 

 and exalt the mind or prove of more practical importance in the selec- 

 tion and cultivation of the most valuable vegetable products in other 

 places and countries than those in which they are commonly found. 

 Forest trees, fruits, grasses, grains, etc., have thus been widely diffused 

 and rendered productive for the best interests of man. The productive 

 strength of a country is justly estimated by its vegetable resources. It is 

 from this, more than from any other consideration of a general char- 

 acter, that our own country is distinguished. A glance at American 

 vegetable geography in the following pages will be a convincing evi- 

 dence of this fact. Linnaeus was the first who, besides his systematic 

 arrangement of plants, gave their stations or habitations ; and he has 

 been followed by many learned and all systematic writers on vegetable 

 nature, especially by Humboldt, Schouw, and Candolle. The laws 

 observed in the distribution of vegetable forms," by the first, is eminently 

 valuble. But we propose by the following remarks a broad survey only 

 of the regions of vegetation, and a glance at the natural agents which 

 influence the situation, life and development of plants. 



Particular plants, it must be obvious to the reader, are limited to 

 particular districts, or parts of the earth. The causes of this are 

 likewise known to be chiefly soil and climate. The two extremes of 

 climate are plainly the tropics and the polar circles. One is exhibited 

 in the most luxuriant and magnificent dress of vegetation within a 

 never-ending summer, while the other exhibits a feeble, diminutive, 

 and scattered vegetation, with little freedom from withering cold and 



