GENERAL DIVISION OF VEGETABLES. 25 



tribes (as was formerly the case in Scotland in regard to the 

 clans), we might find a group of persons resembling each other 

 so strongly in countenance, manners, form of speech, &c., and 

 differing so much from all around them, that we should have 

 little doubt of their belonging to one family; and, going further, 

 we might meet with several such groups, each containing several 

 individuals, and each differing in other characters from the rest. 

 But if we were to bring these families together, we should pro- 

 bably be able to trace more general and less marked resemblances 

 among certain of these, which would lead us to associate them 

 in clans, each of them including many families distinguished by 

 certain points of similarity to one another, as, for example, a 

 strongly-marked feature or a peculiar dialect, whilst differing in 

 these same points from those of the remaining clans, and also 

 differing from each other hi minor points. Again, among these 

 clans we might find some resembling each other, and differing from 

 the rest, in their complexion or language ; and thus forming tribes 

 into which the whole nation might be subdivided. And, lastly, 

 this nation would have certain points of conformity with those 

 inhabiting the same quarter of the globe, whilst yet differing still 

 more strongly from them, than its own tribes do amongst each 

 other : and those inhabiting different quarters shall still more 

 widely differ from each other, in general conformation, com- 

 plexion, language, habits, &c. ; whilst still exhibiting those 

 characters which are peculiar to Man, and which separate him 

 from all other animals. 



19. The primary division of the Vegetable Kingdom is into 

 PHANEROGAMIA or Flowering-plants, and CBYPTOGAMIA or 

 Flowerless-plants. Though these designations are not strictly 

 correct, they serve to indicate sufficiently well the character of 

 the tribes, to which they respectively apply. To the former 

 division belong nearly all cultivated vegetables, the whole of 

 the forest-trees both of our own and of other countries, and a 

 very large proportion of the vegetation, that naturally covers the 

 surface of the earth, in temperate and warm climates. Many of 

 the tribes contained in it, however, produce no distinct blossom ; 

 but these possess the essential parts of the flower (as will be 



