124 BOTANY IN ESSEX COUNTY. 



The railroads had not been built, and stage communica- 

 tion was so slow and expensive that the young student 

 could not run to Boston or Cambridge of a holiday to con- 

 sult libraries and collections even had they existed, as 

 now, in those places. 



With the botanist, however, it was somewhat different. 

 Although the life-histories of plants were little known, 

 and the theory of natural selection and evolution from 

 lower forms was comparatively unheard of, and species 

 were more considered than morphological relations ; yet, 

 in Dr. Jacob Bigelow's "Florula Bostoniensis," first 

 printed in 1814, the second and enlarged edition of which 

 had appeared in 1826, the young botanist had the golden 

 key which should introduce him to an intimate acquaint- 

 ance with nearly every flower and tree his path might 

 cross, in any ramble, hereabouts, and through this ac- 

 quaintance with their names and natures lead him to the 

 closer study of their structure and morphology. To 

 those of us who are only familiar with the study of botany 

 to-day it is difficult to realize the importance of Dr. Big- 

 elow's little volume, or the labor and study expended in 

 its preparation. Begun as a sensible recreation from his 

 arduous professional labors, it became the standard for all 

 botanists in this part of the country, and, for more than 

 a third of a century held the ground undisputed, until 

 the larger and more elaborate works of Dr. Asa Gray 

 superseded it. 



The study of botany in Essex County, we may say in 

 New England, properly dates from the time of Rev. 

 Manasseh Cutler at the close of the last century. Early 

 writers as 'Francis Higginson, John Josselyu, William 

 Wood, John Winthrop and others refer to the native 

 fruits and flowers. Josselyn published the well known 

 "New England Rarities Discovered," an edition of which 



