PREFACE TO PART Y 



The specimens represented in Part V, AMERICAN WOODS, were col- 

 lected in Florida, and prepared previously to those of Part IV, but it was 

 deemed best to hold them until Part IV had been issued, as the species 

 represented in that, as in the earlier parts, are distinctively woods of 

 New York and the adjacent States. Like Part IV, it has suffered the 

 interruption occasioned by the author's duties as Superintendent of the 

 Department of Forestry of the State of New York at the Columbian Ex- 

 position, as detailed in the preface to Part IV, and the specimen portions 

 of the first copies of Part V have, likewise, been sent out in advance of 

 the text. 



I am pleased now to be able to send out the belated text, trusting 

 that I shall not again in the progress of AMERICAN WOODS have occa- 

 sion to issue the two portions of any part separately. 



As for the nomenclature adopted in this part, I have only to say, as 

 heretofore explained, that the importance of conformity with the manuals 

 of botany in common use, and with the early parts of AMERICAN WOODS, 

 does not allow me to make all of the changes recently advocated by sys- 

 tematists, but such names as have a greater or less claim upon common 

 usage, have been mentioned as foot notes. 



In the preparation of Part V, I gratefully acknowledge the assistance 

 rendered by Dr. Chas. Mohr and Mrs. E. G. Britton in determining the 

 synonyms in foreign languages. For aid in the field I am under obliga- 

 tion to Mr. A. H. Curtis, whose familiarity with the flora of Florida is 

 well known, and who generously rendered important service. 



One event and obligation connected with the field work, which I 

 remember with greatest pleasure and which I wish 1 especially to men- 

 tion, was the cordial reception and assistance rendered by the venerable 

 author of " Flora of the Southern States," Dr. A. W. Chapman. At his 

 distant home in Apalachicola, Fla., far remote from others of kindred 

 tastes, I found him, at the age of eighty-two, wonderfully well preserved 

 and surrounded with his books and specimens, as enthusiastic and ener- 

 getic as in the prime of life. It was an inspiration to visit with him, 

 and I acknowledge with gratitude the service he then and has since 

 cheerfully rendered. 



We hope our patrons will be pleased with Part V and thank them 

 cordially for their continued favors. 



LOWYILLE, N. Y., Dec. 31, 1894. 



