v i PLANT STUDIES 
better, they may prefer to combine the two divisions of the 
book much more intimately. 
In any event, the book is not a laboratory guide, or a 
book merely for recitation, but is for reading and study in 
connection with laboratory and field-work. The intention 
is to present a connected, readable account of some of the 
fundamental facts of botany, and to give a certain amount 
of information. If it performs no other service in the 
schools, however, its purpose will be defeated. It is entire- 
ly too compact for any such use, for great subjects, which 
should involve a large amount of observation, are often 
merely suggested. 
It is intended to serve as a supplement to three far more 
important factors : (1) the teacher, who must amplify and 
suggest at every point ; (2) the laboratory, which must bring 
the pupil face to face with plants and their structures; 
(3) field-ivork, which must relate the facts observed in the 
laboratory to their actual place in Nature, and must bring 
new facts to notice which can be observed nowhere else. 
Taking the results obtained from these three factors, the 
book seeks to organize them, and to suggest explanations. 
It seeks to do this in two ways : (1) by means of the text, 
which is intended to be clear and untechnical, but compact ; 
(2) by means of the illustrations, which must be studied as 
carefully as the text, as they are only second in importance 
to the actual material. Especially is this true in reference 
to the landscapes, many of which can not be made a part of 
experience. 
My thanks are due to various members of the Depart- 
ment of Botany of the university for preparing and select- 
ing illustrations. The illustrations of the first fourteen 
