200 HOW TO PRESERVE SPECIMENS, [lESSON 34 



582. Botanical specimens should be either in flower or in fruit. 

 In the case of herbs, the same specimen will often exhibit the two ; 

 and both should by all means be secured whenever it is possible. 

 Of small herbs, especially annuals, the whole plant, root and all, 

 should be taken for a specimen. Of larger ones branches will suf- 

 fice, with some of the leaves from near the root. Enough of the 

 root or subterranean part of the plant should be collected to show 

 whether the plant is an annual, biennial, or perennial. Thick roots, 

 bulbs, tubers, or branches of specimens intended to be preserved, 

 should be thinned with a knife, or cut into slices lengthwise. 



583. For drying Specimens a good supply of soft and unsized paper 

 — the more bibulous the better — is wanted; and some convenient 

 means of applying pressure. All that is requisite to make good dried 

 botanical specimens is, to dry them as rapidly as possible between 

 many thicknesses of paper to absorb their moisture, under as much 

 pressure as can be given without crushing the more delicate parts. 

 This pressure may be given by a botanical press, of which various 

 forms have been contrived ; or by weights placed uprfni a board, — 

 from forty to eighty or a hundred pounds, according to the quantity 

 of specimens drying at the time. For use while travelling, a good 

 portable press may be made of thick binders' boards for the sides, 

 holding the drying paper, and the pressure may be applied by a 

 cord, or, much better, by strong straps with buckles. 



584. For drying paper, the softer and smoother sorts of cheap 

 wrapping-paper answer very well. This paper may be made up 

 into driers, each of a dozen sheets or less, according to the thickness, 

 lightly stitched together. Specimens to be dried should be put into 

 the press as soon as possible after gathering. If collected in a port- 

 folio, the more delicate plants should not be disturbed, but the sheets 

 that hold them should one by one be transferred from the portfolio 

 to the press. Specimens brought home in the botanical box must 

 be laid in a folded sheet of the same thin, smooth, and soft paper 

 used in the portfolio ; and these sheets are to hold the plants until 

 they are dry. They are to be at once laid in between the driers, 

 and the whole put under pressure. Every day (or at first even 

 twice a day would be well) the specimens, left undisturbed in their 

 sheets, are to be shifted into well-dried fresh driers, and the pressure 

 renewed, while the moist sheets are spread out to dry, that they may 

 take their turn again at the next shifting. This course must be 

 continued until the specimens are no longer moist to the touch,— 



