TO TEACHEES. 



THE First Book of Botany was prepared for young children, 

 and was made very simple and elementary, to meet the wants 

 of juvenile minds; but it provides for a course of rudimentary 

 observations which are not to be dispensed with by beginners 

 of any age. As, however, pupils twelve or fifteen years old 

 will hardly be content to go slowly over exercises adapted 

 to young children, it may be asked how these should proceed 

 with the First Book. In reply, it may be said, that Chap- 

 ter IV. of the First Book, upon the flower, and which contains 

 the first part of the flower-schedule, is the only portion of it 

 that is indispensable to entering upon the Second Book. After 

 this is acquired, there need be no difficulty in using both books 

 at the same time. 



I would suggest that an excellent way for older pupils to 

 familiarize themselves with the plant characters pointed out 

 in the First Book, is at once to set about the preservation of 

 plants, as described in Chapter XXI. of the Second Book. 



They may begin by putting a variety of leaves in press, 

 having first carefully compared them with the pictures and 

 definitions of Chapter I., First Book. At each change of the 

 driers, the features of these leaves will be observed, and the 

 names denoting them recalled, and by the time they are dried 

 for mounting, it will be possible, by the aid of the last sched- 

 ule of the chapter, to write, upon the paper holding the spe- 

 cimen, an accurate scientific description of it. Let this be fol- 

 lowed by the pressing of entire plants, after comparing their 

 different organs with the examples shown in the chapters on 

 the Stem, Inflorescence, and Roots. The attention thus 

 drawn to their characters will be kept alive in changing them 



