NEW PUBLICATIONS, 283 



The Flowerless plants are classed in three divisions : 1. Acrogens, 

 embracing ferms, clubmosses and rushes ; 2. Anopliytes, as the 

 mosses ; and 3. Thallophytes, the lichens, algas and fungi. The 

 former class of RhizanfJierc seems to have disappeared, and its 

 wonderful parasitic forms fall into some other division. Thus, all 

 plants fall into five classes, presented in a beautiful Synoptical 

 View on p. 322. 



The artificial subdivision of the Exogens into Polypetalous, Mo- 

 nopetalous VLwdApetalous (p. 323), is still followed, because no struc- 

 tural or organic element has been discovered, which marks the sub- 

 divisions which seem so important to render the study of these plants 

 more easy and intelligible. Hence it is that the system is not made 

 natural throughout ; but very great progress has been made since 

 the days of Linnaeus. The study of the Natural Orders becomes the 

 great object, as the natural affinities and relations of plants are de- 

 signed to be here exhibited. If one is entirely ignorant of botany, 

 it is not so easy perhaps to begin it on the natural system alone. 

 1. Because there is no one order which stands at the head of the 

 whole, and from which there is a closely dependent chain of orders, 

 j 2. Because one is supposed not to know the affinities of vegetables, 

 and in what part of the arrangement particular genera may be placed. 

 3. Because the characters of plants are not perfectly definite, and 

 they require too careful study to be very easy and alluring to the 

 beginner. As the adoption of the artificial method by Linnaeus was 

 a matter of necessity in the study of plants at that period, so the 

 same necessity renders some knowledge and application of it im- 

 portant still, till the principles of the natural system shall be more 

 disseminated. This is happily effected in Wood's Botany, a notice 

 of which was contained in the last number of this Journal. But the 

 time may come ere long, when the study of plants shall be pursued 

 only on the natural system. The Botanical Text Book is fitted to 

 hasten this time. After all the achievements of the artificial system, 

 no one would more heartily rejoice than Linnaeus himself, if he 

 were to behold it, at the establishment of the science of botany on 

 principles purely natural in all its parts. 



The Botanical Text Book should be in the hands of all our in- 

 telligent agriculturalists. The structure, physiology, affinities and 

 economical uses of plants, must interest and gratify the intellect and 

 taste. The study of plants so far will no longer appear as a mere 



VOL. II. — NO. II. 



