Mr. Winch's Observations on his Flora. 139 



that the extremely scarce plants of the Welch and Scotch Alps, reward 

 the toil of the Botanist. 



To those long conversant with this science, the natural arrangement, 

 generally adopted by the French school, would seem to have given the 

 preceding pages the air of greater research ; but the Linnasan method, 

 though artificial, has been chosen : for, as Dr. Hooker justly remarks, 

 " the experience of a hundred years has proved to every unprejudiced 

 mind, that no system can be compared to that of the immortal Swede, for 

 the facility with which it enables any one hitherto unpractised in botany 

 to arrive at a knowledge of the genus and species of a plant." And as 

 the chief value of these memoranda will be in assisting those who are 

 commencing their botanic career, an enumeration of genera and species 

 adapted to their line of study was to be preferred. 



One of the first difficulties the student will have to encounter is the un- 

 settled state in which he will find many genera, and far more species, of 

 plants, so common as to be met with in every hedge and wood ; for, un- 

 fortunately, scarcely two botanists of the present day can agree upon 

 what should constitute generic, much less specific, distinctions. This 

 may appear a startling assertion, but in making it I am borne out by 

 one of the best and most accomplished botanist of our time, whose ideas 

 on this subject I shall take the liberty to give in his own words. " In 

 nothing is more consideration now required than to determine what of 

 new genera ought to be adopted and what rejected. Had you and I 

 begun our botanic career when old Dickson was in his prime, we should 

 have had the same aversion to the Hedwigian improvements which he 

 had, but which have nevertheless tended so very much to the advance- 

 ment of muscology. At the same time I must agree with you, that 

 modern Botanists are carrying their ideas of division and subdivision to 

 a most unwarrantable length, and that they are thereby doing an injury 

 rather than a benefit to science, and are deterring many from under- 

 taking the study altogether. I must not be supposed to condemn the 

 subdivision of genera on every occasion. If there is a distinction in the 

 habit of the plant, and a different mode of fructification at the same 

 time, then I will allow the genus may be a good one. Then again there 



