VI PREFACE. 



course of botanical instruction of this kind. Professor 

 Lawson and myself found our own difficulties scarcely 

 less considerable than those of the students. The 

 interest, however, which the novelty of the new method 

 of work excited in the class soon became very obvious. 

 The enthusiasm of the more skilful students at once 

 stimulated and assisted us, and at the conclusion of the 

 course we found that there was scarcely anything of 

 importance in the rather comprehensive range which 

 had been attempted which the students had not been 

 able to study, examine, and draw for themselves. 



This course was an experiment. It was repeated at 

 irregular intervals during the next few years. It 

 gradually took a more systematic shape, and with the 

 appointment of Mr. Bower . as Lecturer on Botany in 

 the Normal School, it is likely, I think, to settle 

 down into a permanent system of instruction. 



I had always hoped to put together the results of the 

 experience in teaching methods acquired at South 

 Kensington in the form of a handbook, which should 

 save teachers who wished to follow our example from 

 much of the trouble and difficulty which I, and those 

 who, at different times, have taught in this way, have 

 had to face. But, in the meanwhile, I had been drawn 

 off to administrative duties which have left a steadily 

 diminishing leisure for purely scientific work. For- 

 tunately, my friend Mr. Bower was willing and with 

 far greater competence to take up the task which I 

 was unable to perform, and to him are entirely due the 



