VI 



PREFACE. 



European herbarium, was found more than twenty years ago by Dr. Jedediah Smith, in 

 Washington County. He obtained only two specimens, both of which (though in a muti- 

 lated state) are still in existence, and no others have since been obtained. Diligent but 

 unsuccessful search has been made for it in the original locality of Dr. Smith. 



It is remarkable, that on the shores of the Great Lakes, there are certain plants, the 

 proper station of which is the immediate neighborhood of the ocean, as if they had consti- 

 tuted part of the early Flora of those regions, when the lakes were filled with salt water, 

 and have survived the change that has taken place in the physical conditions of their soil. 

 Among such species may be enumerated Cakile maritima, Hudsonia tomentosa, Lathrus 

 mmitijnus, and Euphorbia pobj gonifolia. 



Of proper maritime phenogamous plants, the shores of Long Island and Staten Island, 

 as well as the counties of New-York and Westchester where they border on the Hudson 

 and the Sound, afford about fifty species, none of which are seen beyond the limits of salt, 

 or, at least, brackish, water, except a few which occur in the saline soils of Salina and 

 Syracuse. 



The whole number of Flowering Plants hitherto found in the State is about 1450 species, 

 which is 100 more than were enumerated in my preliminary Report of 1840. Of Ferns 

 and their allies, 60 species belong to our Flora. The other cryptogamic orders have not 

 yet been fully determined, as I find their number so great that they could not be included 

 in the two volumes to which my first Report was limited. An account of such as belong 

 to the orders Musci, Hepatica;, Lichenes, Characeffi and Alga;, will be given in a future 

 volume if authorized by the Legislature. The Fungi constitute so peculiar a department 

 of the Vegetable Kingdom, and their species are so extremely numerous, that a botanist, 

 to do them justice, must make them almost an exclusive study. The late Rev. M. de 

 ScnwEiNiTz has given us a list of more than 3000 species belonging to the United States, 

 most of which he found in tlxe State of Pennsylvania. There can be little doubt that a 

 very large proportion of them grow in New- York ; but in collecting these plants, I have 

 been obliged to confine myself to the more important species. 



A Report on the Botany of our State would possess little value, unless the plants were 

 described so that they could be identified ; and the only way in which this could be done 

 (unless the descriptions are extended to an unreasonable length) , is by employing botanical 

 language, and by arranging tlie plants in methodical order. Hence I was induced to put 

 the matter of my report in the form of a Flora. Having adopted this plan, I could not 

 hesitate for a moment as to the system which ought to be used ; for the artificial classifi- 

 cation of Linna-us, having acconiplislied the object for which it was designed, may be 

 considered as more than useless in (he present advanced state of Botany. The natural 

 arrangement has tlierefore been followed. In defining the orders, it has been deemed 

 advisable, in many instances, to omit characters that belong exclusively to exotic plants. 

 The groups of orders have been adopted, with but little alteration, from the admirable 

 Botanical Text Book of my friend Dr. Gray. As to the names of synonyms of genera and 

 species, the Flora of North America has been followed, as far as that work is published, 



