INTRODUCTION TO CRYPTOGAMIC BOTANY. 21 



bearing their own agnomen. Indeed, with the meagre mate- 

 rials which too often fall to the share of such botanists, it is 

 impossible but that, without enlarged views, they should fall 

 into continual error. If for example a single specimen of 

 each form should be selected from the noble series now at 

 Kew, made with a view to the illustration of the Flora of 

 Tasmania, consisting of several hundred individuals of par- 

 ticular species, it would be almost impossible, without much 

 enlargement of mental vision in addition to great nicety of tact, 

 to avoid making some twenty species of what to a person with 

 all the materials before him are evidently one and the same,* 

 and this is far more applicable to cryptogamic plants, where 

 it is often quite impossible to frame a specific character from 

 outward form sufiiciently comprehensive, but where, on the 

 contrary, characters drawn up from individual specimens, might 

 seem to indicate good species. Take, for instance, almost any 

 widely diffused species of fern, and it will be well if generic cha- 

 racters as well as specific are not at fault. But a more fitting 

 place for the discussion of such variation will occur hereafter. 



12. Having made these observations to meet the suscepti- 

 bility of any who may be incUned to think that cryptogamic 

 botanists are less honoured than is meet, or the prejudices of stu- 

 dents who might, in consequence of such a thought, be deterred 

 from a most interesting and important branch of study, I proceed 

 to show the real objects which lie before the Oryptogamist ; 

 meanwhile premising, that he can scarcely hope to derive all 

 the profit which is possible, unless he be tolerably well versed 

 in the structure and physiology of the higher plants. At the 

 same time, though his attention may be more especially directed 

 to one particular branch of Cryptogams, if he wishes to work 

 with any certainty, or to arrive at any permanent results, he 

 should by no means neglect altogether other branches. 



* I speak of this from personal knowledge, having been kindly allowed 

 to select a complete set for an eminent Swedish . botanist. It was at 

 once manifest what inextricable confusion must arise if the Flora were 

 attempted to be worked up from scanty materials. Not only would 

 mere forms be erected into species, but each form would give rise to 

 nearly as many species, in some instances, as there were individual 

 specimens. 



