INTRODUCTION 



thirst for a more intimate knowledge of them. They became 

 like dear friends, soothing and cheering, by their sweet 

 unconscious influence, hours of loneliness and hours of 

 sorrow and suffering. 



Having never made botany a study, and having no one 

 to guide and assist me, it was acquiring knowledge under 

 difficulties, by observation only; but the eye and the ear 

 are good teachers, and memory is a great storehouse, in 

 which are laid up things new and old which may be drawn 

 out for use in after years. It is a book the leaves of which 

 can be turned over and read from childhood to old age 

 without weariness. 



Having experienced the need of some familiar work 

 giving the information respecting the names and habits 

 and uses of the native plants, I early conceived the idea of 

 turning the little knowledge which I gleaned from time to 

 time to supplying a book which I had felt the great want 

 of myself; but I hesitated to enter the field when all I 

 had gathered had been from merely studying the subject 

 without any regular systematic knowledge of botany. The 

 only book that I had access to was an old edition of 

 " North American Flora," by that industrious and in- 

 teresting botanist, Frederick Pursh. This work was lent 

 to me by a friend, the only person I knew who had paid 

 any attention to botany as a study, and to whom I was 

 deeply indebted for many hints and for the cheering in- 

 terest that she always took in my writings, herself possess- 

 ing the advantages of a highly cultivated mind, educated 

 and trained in the society of persons of scientific and 

 literary notoriety in the Old Country. Mrs. Stewart was 

 a member of the celebrated Edgeworth family. Pursh's 

 " Flora," unfortunately for me, was written chiefly in 



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