196 THE CORRESPONDENCE OF SCHWEINITZ AND TORREY 
your remarks on my Flora [89]. You may be assured my dear 
Sir I duly appreciate your kindly feelings towards me. I wish it 
were possible for you to see my manuscript as fast as I prepare it 
for the press (for I have only notes prepared—the copy for the 
printer is written out as fast as it is demanded) but this seems im- 
possible, from the great distance between us. Of the species 
which you desire I can procure you a part—but not all, as there 
are several which I should be very glad to see myself, such as 
Aira pumila Ph., Ceratochloa unioloides & Gratiola megalocarpa.— 
Do by all means let me have the plants you offer,—particularly 
your Fest[uca] diandra. In my next I shall reply to some of 
your remarks— 
) ed 
SCHWEINITZ TO TORREY 
BETHLEHEM Nov. Ist 1823 
My dear Sir i 
Yours of the 15th ult. gave me the most sincere pleasure, & 
I beg to thank you in a particular manner for devoting a part of 
your so much occupied time to a correspondence which I am so 
sensible cannot be half as interesting to you as it is to me. No less 
obliged do I feel by your remarks concerning the Carices. Indeed 
I am anxious to add the species you mention to my analytical 
table [67] as well as to make some necessary corrections. To 
you who are so intimately acquainted with the Graminae it may 
appear an inexcusable superficiality & indeed I blush to own it— 
but still relying on the French adage ‘‘Qu’une erreur découvert 
vaut toujours une vérité trouvée” I must do so—I find that I 
stumbled grievously on the very threshold (but I hope in that 
one instance only so badly). For upon a closer examination of 
my Carex leonina—I have made the discovery that it is no Carex 
at all but most manifestly your Scirpus planifolius. It is as- 
tonishing how easily one is sometimes misled by a prejudice that * 
once takes possesion of the mind. Not having the smallest doubt 
of its being a Carex I neglected that part of the analysis which, 
when undertaken afterward at once convinced me of my mistake. 
But let me make a remark upon your objection to the analytical 
way I propose. I am perfectly sensible of its imperfections & 
that it by no means suffices to give a full & clear idea of a species- 
