Introduction. 



gressive. It is necessary for the student of Botany to proceed 

 by deliberate advances. Festina lente is his safest maxim. He 

 must begin by learning the elements of the science as a child 

 learns letters. He must first acquire a thorough familiarity 

 with the simplest and broadest distinctions between the great 

 divisions of the Vegetable Kingdom, the reasons upon which 

 those distinctions rest, the names of the parts on which they 

 depend, the differences of organization, the modifications of 

 structure or of appearance, which are the foundation of the 

 modern science of Botany. In short, Botany cannot be under- 

 stood in its most interesting and most important view, without 

 a very considerable degree of patience and toil ; especially in 

 taking the primary steps. It is like a noble fortification, of 

 which the outposts are the most difficult to be captured, but 

 which, when once in the hands of the invader, offer a com- 

 paratively easy access to the more important, but less strongly 

 guarded interior. Such, indeed, is the condition on which all 

 valuable knowledge must be obtained; and the assertion 

 is a safe one, that whatever learning can be easily and super- 

 ficially acquired, is in itself superficial. An eminent author 

 has maintained that the popular notion that Botany is a 

 science of easy acquirement, is a popular error, and to this 

 position we entirely assent. To the study of Botany, one who 

 wishes to master it as a science, must bring no ordinary com- 

 bination of faculties. To patience he must add quickness of 

 perception ; to methodical habits of thought, a certain kind 

 and degree of imagination ; to comprehensive views of nature, 

 the power to enter into the most minute details. On the one 

 hand, he must be calm and considerate ; on the other, ener- 

 getic, enthusiastic and inquiring; capable as well of long con- 

 tinued and laborious effort as of dexterous and versatile exer- 

 tion. And yet, to assert that Botany is not calculated for a 

 popular object of study, would be as absurd as the same 

 assertion in regard to the science of music : and an argument 

 against the general pursuit of the former, based upon the fact 



