XVlll PKEFACE. 



of Wight alone, and beyond its limits I do not hold myself 

 accountable for their accuracy. 



When the flowering period is expressed by an interval of 

 three or four months, the initial and terminal month, or at least 

 the greater part of each, is to be understood as included in that 

 space of time. So likewise with some of the early spring 

 flowerers : the naming of two successive months denotes that 

 such species may, in favourable seasons, be gathered with con- 

 siderable certainty during the first, and in all ordinary years 

 during the second, month in a perfect state of inflorescence. 

 Besides the flowering, the fruiting or seeding time has been 

 max-ked for each species, as far as could be accomplished by 

 observations, no less carefully made, although more recently 

 begun. * This adoption of the season of fructification is bor- 

 rowed from the excellent American ' Flora Cestrica ' of Dr. 

 Darlington, t and though, I believe, nearly a novel feature in a 

 European Flora, + will, I think, be found useful to the carpolo- 

 gical inquirer, as also to the botanical cultivator, by pointing 

 out to them the proper time for collecting seeds in a state fit 

 for their respective purposes. But since the process of matu- 

 ration is in general slow and protracted, and, compared with 

 that of inflorescence (with which, in its later stages, it often 

 advances pari passu), marked by no well-defined period of 

 commencement or completion, the same accuracy of indication 

 is hardly attainable for the fruiting as for the flowering season, 

 depending, as the former does, still more than the latter, on 

 temperature for its advancement or retardation. 



* [It is to be regretted that the author had, to a very limited extent only, 

 carried out this part of his intentions, although in his MS. a space had been uni- 

 formly reserved for the result of his observations on this head. — Edrs.] 



f ' Flora Cestrica, an attempt to enumerate and describe the Flowering 

 and Filicoid Plants of Chester County, in the State of Pennsylvania,' by Wil- 

 liam Darlington, M.D., 8vo, 1837. 



X It Vfas partially carried out by Pollich, in the ' Flora of the Palatinate.' 



