( iv ) 



the hand-books of all students. It was evident then, when the present 

 writer undertook the charge of botauical study here,, in 1858, that a new 

 List, and particularly a revision of the larger and more difficult groups, 

 with a view to bringing these into conformity with Gray's Manual, was 

 first of all needed : and this was at once set about, and these groups 

 arranged mainly as they now stand; but little comparatively having 

 since been added to them. In this work I was constantly indebted to 

 Prof. Gray ; as also, in various parts, to Dr. George Engelmann, Dr. 

 J. W. Robbins of Uxbridge, and, in Carex, to the late Dr. Francis Boott 

 of London. The difficulties of the new catalogue were thus at an end, 

 audit might long since have been put into print; but has certainly 

 gained, in not a few interesting additions, by the delay. Due mention is 

 made, in the following pages, of the many friends whose labours of love 

 have augmented our Flora ; as it has also been intended to indicate the 

 original finder of every peculiarly interesting plant. And I take pleasure 

 in expressing here my indebtedness to the late President Hitchcock ; to 

 Prof. W. S. Clark, my predecessor in the botanical lecture-room, and 

 now President of the Massachusetts Agricultural College; to Prof. G. L. 

 Goodale, now of Harvard University, in whose company, when a 

 student of Amherst College, much of my herborizing was done; to 

 Prof. C. H. Hitchcock, now of Dartmouth College; and, last but not 

 least, to Rev. H. G. Jesup of this town, who has recently gone over the 

 larger part of the ground afresh, with unsurpassed care, and added, as 

 these pages shew, a very considerable number of new things. It is 

 to the same gentleman that the College owes the foundation and the 

 building up of its new North American herbarium. Nor can I forget 

 the younger friend, not long since taken from us, the late E. F. Bishop, 

 of what is now the Senior Class, whose keen eye was as valuable, in 

 every botanical excursion, whether by land or water, as his willing arm ; 

 and who made our long neglected TJtriculariee entirely his own. 



The Linnsean school of botanists by no means passed over, in their 

 botanizing, the lower cryptogamous plants, which the then imperfect 

 knowledge, and simple arrangements, made comparatively easy. And 

 Muhlenberg, in his Catalogue of North American plants (1818) set the 

 example for us of a similar attempt at an universal view of vegetation ; 

 in which he was followed by Torrey, in his early New York Catalogue 

 (1819) as well as by Dr. Hitchcock, in his Amherst Catalogue (1829) 

 and in his Massachusetts Catalogue (1835). It needed no argument to 

 shew that the new List should cover the same ground; and, most 



