TO THE STUDY OF BOTANY. d 



might, with more propriety, have been rendered 

 a Moss. 



Wide as the vegetable kingdom extends, we 

 should wander unprofitably over it without a 

 guide ; and many are the celebrated names of men, 

 who, traversing the rich territory, have felt the 

 disadvantage of wanting a map to direct them. 

 Happily, however, they have, by recording their 

 discoveries, left no such disadvantage to be felt by 

 us. The earlier sketches of the country were but 

 rude. Successive efforts improved upon them ; 

 but the Linnean survey now indicates the track 

 which the botanical traveller may henceforth con- 

 fidingly pursue. 



Botanical writers have so generally adopted 

 the system which Linneus devised, that, without 

 some knowledge of that system, their treatises 

 would not be intelligible to us, and the description 

 of a plant in Linnean language would convey no 

 image whatever to our minds. 



The business of the following pages shall 

 therefore be to explain the Linnean arrangement, 

 and to enable the student to attach to every term 

 its appropriate idea. 



To possess this ability is, in truth, to have 

 mastered the mysteries of the Science ; and a few 



