ni. FLORA OF BRITAIN. 385 



flowering plants along with the ferns and fern-allies, and 

 excluding the cellular flowerless plants ; it being practi' 

 cally impossible to treat the distribution of these latter in 

 the same manner as that of the former. But the same 

 word has also a different signification in botany, in regard 

 to which it may not be out of place here to make a 

 suggestion to botanists and printers. The word is in use 

 both as the name of a book or class of books, and as a 

 term of science. In the latter sense, when designating a 

 collective total of species, it is properly printed without 

 an initial capital ; unless, of course, when its employment 

 as a head-title or other cii'cumstance should render a 

 capital letter indispensable. When used as the name of 

 a book, which enumerates the plants of any given country, 

 the same word would be conveniently distinguished by an 

 initial capital. If this rule were observed, the ' British 

 flora ' would always be understood to mean the group or 

 totality of British plants ; and the ' British Flora ' would 

 mean a book, in which those plants are described. It is 

 curious to note the obscurity of meaning, which occasion- 

 ally arises from disregard of this ready distinction in 

 printed books. While no such distinction is made, " the 

 species of the British Flora " may mean either those de^ 

 scribed as such in the work of Hooker and Arnott, or 

 those found wild in Britain ; and these two are by no 

 means necessarily the same gi'oups of plants, either nu" 

 merically or specifically. 



2. Geographical Affinities. -^-The place occupied by our 

 insular flora in that of the whole earth, or the relation 

 borne by the former to the latter, or to any section of the 

 latter, may claim some few pages of remark. In accord' 

 ance with the geogi-aphical position of the British Isles 

 their flora is almost exclusively European. It is a 

 VOL. IV. 3d 



