OUTLINES OF BOTANY. 



CHAP. I. DEFINITIONS AND DESCRIPTIVE BOTANY. 



1. The principal object of a Flora of a country, is to afford the means 

 of determining (i.e. ascertaining the name of) any plant growing in it, 

 whether for the purpose of ulterior study or of intellectual exercise. 



2. With this view, a Flora consists of descriptions of all the wild or 

 native plants contained in the country in question, so drawn up and ar- 

 ranged that the student may identify with the corresponding description 

 any individual specimen -which he may gather. 



3. These descriptions should be clear, concise, accurate, and characte- 

 ristic, so as that each one should be readily adapted to the plant it relates 

 to, and to no other one ; they should be as nearly as possible arranged 

 under natural (184) divisions, so as to facilitate the comparison of each 

 plant -with those nearest allied to it ; and they should be accompanied by 

 an artificial key or index, by means of which the student may be guided 

 step by step in the observation of such peculiarities or characters in his 

 plant, as may lead him, with the least delay, to the individual description 

 belonging to it. 



4. For descriptions to be clear and readily intelligible, they should be 

 expressed as much as possible in ordinary well-established language. But, 

 for the purpose of accuracy, it is necessary not only to give a more precise 

 technical meaning to many terms used more or less vaguely in common 

 conversation, but also to introduce purely technical names for such parts of 

 plants or forms as are of little importance except to the botanist. In the 

 present chapter it is proposed to define such technical or technically limited 

 terms as are made use of in these Floras. 



5. At the same time mathematical accuracy must not be expected. The 

 forms and appearances assumed by plants and their parts are infinite. 

 Names cannot be invented for all ; those even that have been proposed are 

 too numerous for ordinary memories. Many are derived from supposed 

 resemblances to well-known forms or objects. These resemblances are 

 differently appreciated by different persons, and the same term is not only 

 differently applied by two different botanists, but it frequently happens 



