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XiV 



PREFACE. 



copyist of the lowest rank, docked out with ini 



posinir, but borrowed feathers." 



to? 



With 



force of these truths constantly operating, I have 

 spent much time and labour in consulting the 

 authors quoted; abundant proofs of which are 



What- 



g pages 



scattered through the followin 



ever errors, therefore, I may have fallen into, I 



confidently trust I shall be acquitted of those of 



a copyist. 



I will not pretend that every plant in Barbados 

 has been described. Some, very many perhaps, 

 from the infreqnency of their occurrence in ordi- 

 nary situations, and from their minuteness, I 

 can readily believe have escaped observation. 

 Several have been purposely omitted, as I had 

 not been able to see and examine them in their 

 flowering and fruiting states, when I was hurried 

 from the island by ill health. Some, which I was 

 led to expect to find, were searched for in vain, 

 and have probably been exterminated by the 

 almost universal cultivation of the soil, or remain 

 only in the most secluded and inaccessible spots. 

 When any doubt has remained on my mind 

 respecting a plant from insufficient opportunity 

 of examining it, which, in more than one instance, 

 has been the case, I have thought it incumbent 

 on me to mark that doubt by a note of intcrro- 



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