PREFACE. 
WueEn revising the fourth edition of my late friend’s ‘‘ Hand- 
book of the British Flora,” I abstained from making other 
additions or alterations than appeared to me to be absolutely 
necessary, and consistent with the object of the work, which 
is, as stated in the title-page, “for the use of beginners and 
amateurs.” In the Preface to the first, 1858, but in no sub- 
sequent edition, Mr. Bentham explained his motives for pre- 
senting his work to the public, and the method he followed 
in preparing it: and inasmuch as he therein gives his reasons 
for adopting a different treatment of British plants from 
what obtains in other works devoted to our native Flora, it 
appears to me to be expedient, now that the editorship has 
~ passed into other hands, to repeat what he there says in his 
own words :— | 
“In adding to the number of British Floras already before 
the public, it is not attempted to enter into competition with 
either of the standard scientific works whose merits have been 
tested through several successive editions. The Author’s 
object has been rather to supply a deficiency which he believes 
has been much felt. He has been frequently applied to, to 
recommend a work which should enable persons having no 
previous knowledge of Botany to name the wild flowers they 
might gather in their country rambles. He has always been 
much embarrassed how to answer this inquiry. The book he 
had. himself used under similar circumstances in a foreign 
country, the ‘Flore Francaise’ of De Candolle, is inapplicable 
to Britain, and has long been out of print even in the country 
