2 INTBODTJCTION. 



hand to avoid that prolixity of detail and overloading with technical terms 

 which tends rather to confusion than clearness. In this he will be more or 

 less successful. The aptness of a botanical description, hke the beauty of 

 a work of imagiaation, wiU always vary with the style and genius of the 

 author. 



§ 1; Tlie Plant in General. 



The Plant, in its botanical sense, includes every being which has vegetable 

 life, from the loftiest tree which adorns our landscapes, to the humblest 

 moss wliich grows on its stem, to the mould or fungus wliich attacks our 

 provisions, or the green scum that floats on our ponds. 



Every portion of a plant whicli has a distinct part cue function to perform 

 in the operations or phenomena of vegetable life is called an Organ. 



What constitutes vegetable life, and what are the functions of each organ, 

 belong to Vegetable Physiology ; the microscopical structure of the tissues 

 composing the organs, to Vegetable Anatomy ; the composition of the sub- 

 stances of which they are formed, to Vegetable Chemistry ; and it is unneces- 

 sary here to enter into any details as to the terms specially used m either of 

 these branches of botany. For our present purpose we have only to con- 

 sider the forms of organs, their Morphology, in the proper sense of the term, 

 and their general structure so far as it affects classification and specific re- 

 semblances and differences. 



In the more perfect plants, their organs are comprised in the general terms 

 Root, Stem, Leaves, PloTvers, and Fruit. Of these the three first, 

 whose function is to assist in the growth of the plant, are called Organs 

 of vegetation ; the flower and fruit, whose office is the formation of the seed, 

 are the Organs of reproduction. 



All these organs exist in some shape or another, at some period of the Ufe 

 of most, if not aH, flowering plants, technically caMed pihcenogamous ov pha- 

 nerogamous plants ; which all bear some kind of flower, in tlie botanical 

 sense of the term. In the lower classes, tlie ferns, mosses, fungi, moulds or 

 mildews, seaweeds, etc., called by botanists cryptogamous plants, th-e flower, 

 and not unfrequently one or more of the organs of vegetation, are either 

 wanting, or replaced by organs so different as to be hardly capable of bearing 

 the same name. 



The observations comprised in the following pages refer exclusively to the 

 flowering or pheenogamous plants. The study of the cryptogamous classes 

 has now become so comphcated as to form almost a separate science. They 

 are therefore not included in the introductory observations, nor, with the 

 exception of ferns, in the present Flora. 



Plants are 



Moiiocarjjic, if they die after one flowering season. These include Annuals, 

 which flower in the same year in which they are raised from seed, and 

 Biennials, which only flower in the year following that in which they are 

 sown. 



Cavlocarpic, if, after flowering, the whole or part of the plant Hves tlu"ough 

 the winter and produces fi'esh flowers another season. These include, Her- 

 baceous perennials, in which the greater part of the plant dies after flowering, 

 leaving only a small perennial portion called the Stock, close to, or within 

 the earth ; Undershrubs, m which the flowering branches, forming a con- 

 siderable portion of the plant, die down after floweruig, but leave a more or 

 less prominent perennial and woody base ; Shrubs, m which the perennial 

 woody part forms the greater part of the plant, but branches near the base, 



