XX PREFACE. 



times I have doubted whether these ends have been 

 so fully ansvf^ered as its partial author might expect ; 

 and whether the great facility with which a trivial and 

 superficial knowledge of plants is now gained, by 

 turning over books of coloured figures, may not be 

 injurious to true science. The flippancy with which 

 every body quotes " Sowerby," whom they know 

 merely as the delineator of these plates, without ad- 

 verting to the information of the work, or the name of 

 its author, leads me to the mortifying conclusion, that 

 all I have done is of little avail, except to the pene- 

 trating eyes of the scientific few, who stand less in 

 need of such assistance. But with their approbation 

 I am conscious I oug^ht to be content. 



The acquisition of the Linnaean herbarium soon 

 discovered to the botanists of England that many of 

 our native plants had hitherto been mistaken, and 

 that the nomenclature of our whole Flora stood in 

 need of revision. Hence I was led to undertake a 

 Latin Flora Britminica, of which two volumes were 

 published in 1800, and a third in 1804. This last 

 concludes with the Miisci, the rest of the crypto- 

 gamic orders remaining as yet unfinished. The 

 chief merit to which this work aspires is originality. 

 The author has examined every thing for himself, 

 copying nothing without investigation. Every ge- 

 neric and specific character has been scrutinized, 

 and, where necessary, corrected ; and the descrip- 

 tions are all made from wild British specimens. 

 Any borrowed fact or information is invariably ac- 

 knowledged. The Flora Britannica has been fa- 

 vourably received, both at horn and abroad. It 

 was reprinted, word for word, by Dr. Romer at 



