156 FOBEST CULTUBE AND 



Belladonna and Calabar Bean. Here medicine, chem- 

 istry, and phytology go hand in hand. How, again, 

 is any analysis of the chemic constituents of any 

 plant, for cultural purposes or otherwise, to be ap- 

 plied, unless we command a language of phytographic 

 expressions which will name with never- failing pre- 

 cision the object before us, and give to its elucidation 

 value and stability ? 



We may speak chemically ol potash plants, lime 

 plants, and so forth ; we may wish to define thereby 

 the direction of certain industrial pursuits, and we 

 may safely thereby foretell what plants can be raised 

 profitably on any parjicurar soil or with the use of 

 any particular manure ; but how is this knowledge to 

 be fixed without exact phytologic information, or how 

 is the knowledge to be applied, if we are to trust to 

 vernacular names, perplexing even within the area 

 of a small colony, and useless, as a rule, beyond it ? 

 Colonial Box-trees by dozens, yet all distinct, and 

 utterly unlike Turkey Box ; colonial Myrtle, without 

 the remotest resemblance to the poet's myrtle ; colo- 

 nial Oaks, analogous to those Indian trees which as 

 Casuarinse were distinguished so graphically by Rumpf 

 two hundred years ago, but without a trace of simi- 

 larity to any real Oak — afford instances of our confused 

 and ludicrous vernacular appellations. A total change 

 is demanded, resting on the rational observations and 

 deductions which science already has gained for us. 

 Assuredly, with any claims to ordinary intelligence, 

 we ought to banish such designations, not only from 

 museum collections, but also from the dictionary of 

 the artisan. 



One of the genera ot Mushrooms, certainly the 



