BOTANY FOR YOUNG PEOPLE. 139 



occasionally sprinkling water upon them. You 

 can use the box I employ, for this purpose, and 

 it will be seldom empty if you continue study- 

 ing botany as you have commenced. Do not 

 forget that three hundred specimens carefully 

 analysed will rank you among the order of 

 botanists. 



For your herbarium, a different course must 

 be pursued : provide yourself with as many old 

 newspapers as you can, file them, and between 

 their leaves, some pages intervening for each 

 plant, place your specimens ; over the top of all 

 lay your largest atlas, covered with enough books 

 to make it quite heavy. The paper will absorb 

 the mixture ; taking them out often, and expos- 

 ing both paper and plants to a current of air, 

 will materially help the drying. You can easily 

 tell when this is accomplished, and must then 

 transfer them to your blank-book. Write on 

 each page with the flower, the class, order, 

 genus, and specific name, and the place where 

 you found it, or the name of the person, if a 

 present, as well as the location. It will be well 

 to have a regular description on one side of the 

 page, and the flower on the other. 



L. How long does it take them to dry ? 





