PREFACE 



THERE are many excellent textbooks of Botany 

 suitable for students of all stages, but nearly all deal 

 with European plants alone or are written from the 

 standpoint of European botany ; and there are many 

 little points in which a Botany founded on tropical 

 plants would differ, as instance .the absence of well 

 protected winter elementary buds, the fewness of 

 biennials, and the much greater importance of what I 

 have called multiennials l and of succulents. 



This book has, therefore, been written for those 

 beginning Botany in India, and an attempt has been 

 made to treat the subject from a tropical standpoint. 



Since no illustrations, however perfect in detail, can 

 take the place of actual specimens, plants which are 

 well known by name and can easily be procured are 

 not figured, or only sufficiently so for identification ; 

 on the other hand, difficult points, like those in the 

 flowers of orchids and grasses, are shown, it is hoped, 



1 This word is, as far as I know, new, but seems so obvious 

 a designation of the habit of flowering once after many years, that 

 it may not be so. The only reference I have seen to the habit 

 by name is in Warming's Lehbuch de Algemeine Botanik where 

 such plants are called Pleiocyklishe Gewasche (S. 72). In view 

 of the commonly accepted term, biennial, for plants of two 

 seasons, multiennial would seem more natural to English readers. 



9&1919 



