

GENEALOGY. 131 



'Charites/ (Graces), and there will be divided into these 

 five genera, Eosa, Persica, Pomum, Kubra, and Fragaria. 

 Which sequence of names I do not think the young learner 

 will have difficulty in remembering ; nor in understanding 

 why I distinguish the central group by the fruit instead of 

 the flower. And if he once clearly master the structure 

 and relations of these five genera, he will have no difficulty 

 in attaching to them, in a satellitic or subordinate manner, 

 such inferior groups as that of the Silver-weed, or the Tor- 

 mentilla ; but all he will have to learn by heart and rote, will 

 be these six names ; the Greek Master-name, Charites, and 

 the five generic names, in each case belonging to plants, as 

 he will soon find, of extreme personal interest to him. 



21. I have used the word ' Order ' as the name of our 

 widest groups, in preference to ' Class,' because these widest 

 groups will not always include flowers like each other in 

 form, or equal to each other in vegetative rank ; but they will 

 be ' Orders,' literally like those of any religious or chivalric 

 association, having some common link rather intellectual than 

 national, the Charites, for instance, linked by their kind- 

 ness, the Oreiades, by their mountain seclusion, as Sisters 

 of Charity or Monks of the Chartreuse, irrespective of ties of 

 relationship. Then beneath these orders will come, what 

 may be rightly called, either as above in Greek derivation, 

 ' Genera,' or in Latin, ' Gentes,' for which, however, I choose 

 the Latin word, because Genus is disagreeably liable to be 

 confused on the ear with ' genius ' ; but Gens, never ; and 

 also * nomen gentile ' is a clearer and better expression than 

 ' nomen generosum,' and I will not coin the barbarous one, 

 'Genericum.' The name of the Gens, (as 'Lucia,') with an 

 attached epithet, as ' Verna,' will, in most cases, be enough to 

 characterize the individual flower ; but if farther subdivision 

 be necessary, the third order will be that of Families, indi- 

 cated by a ' nomen familiare ' added in the third place of 

 nomenclature, as Lucia Verna, Borealis ; and no farther 

 subdivision will ever be admitted. I avoid the word * species' 

 originally a bad one, and lately vulgarized beyond endur- 

 ance altogether. And varieties belonging to narrow locali- 



