58 Garden Botany. 



dedicated, accompanied by an as popularly written account 

 of the subject as the matter will admit of, serves for the 

 immediate and imperishable record of species, which never 

 after lose their place in the forthcoming systems of natural 

 history ; while they remain a standard for compilers to refer 

 to, serving at the same time to lighten their labour. We 

 believe that many a tolerable botanist has been made by 

 these works, and still more collectors, ever upon the alert to 

 assemble the curious and new objects of their pursuits, that 

 they may behold them a part of the general history of nature, 

 and be taught their story, while they themselves become the 

 means of having a value stamped upon things which had 

 none before. A plant, for instance, that is to remain unknown 

 to its possessor except by its fugitive blossoms, or till the 

 owner becomes a botanist, is valueless, and escapes attention ; 

 while by the publications to which we allude, the pursuits and 

 expenses of the collector and the florist, otherwise lost and 

 useless, are rendered important to knowledge, and are made 

 to enlarge the sphere of its activity, as well as to contribute 

 to the amount of its treasures. It is not much above thirty 

 years that a work of this kind appeared amongst us, and the 

 diffusion of a taste for the study of nature has, to our cer- 

 tain knowledge and observation at least kept pace with that 

 appearance. Formerly the rarest vegetable bloomed for its 

 master alone, or perhaps to the desert air ; now a blossom 

 no sooner expands than its representation is spread, not only 

 over this country, but in a short period reaches the abode 

 of every botanist, even of him who dwells at the foot of 

 Mount Caucasus, and makes an addition to the general fund 

 of literature, while it brings in contact the learned and 

 lovers of science in every region. The reference to a figure 

 enables the inhabitant of Petersburgh and Vienna to acquire 

 the plant he wishes to possess from the nurseryman in 

 London ; while a name without a figure had long proved a 

 source of irremediable confusion and imposition between the 

 two. The more costly works published by the assistance of the 

 continental governments, are useful only to the rich, and to the 

 student who has access to their libraries ; to the bulk of man- 

 kind they are unknown, and of no avail. To detect a species, 

 in the general enumerations of plants, is only within the 

 power of one already versed in the science; to others these 

 works are unfathomable." 



To these observations we may add one word more upon 

 the utility of the scientific and theoretical speculations which 

 are introduced into the most important of these publications ; 

 and to this we are particularly induced by the knowledge 



