90 
LADIES BOTANY AND BOTANY FOR LADIES. 
equally easy ? That is the point." And then 
he proceeds hy showing cases in which it will 
fail the student altogether. Mrs. Loudon 
says — " There was something in the Linna3an 
system excessively repugnant to me. I never 
could remember the different classes and 
orders, and after several attempts the study 
was given up, as one too difficult for me to 
master." Mrs. Loudon, therefore, was one of 
those students " who could not master them 
in a day." Dr. Lindley rejects the Linnaean 
system on much better grounds than the mere 
difficulty of understanding them, for he asks, 
and there is a volume in the question, " what 
have you done towards discovering a genus 
and species, when you have learned the class 
and order?" It is true in many cases we 
shall have done but little, unless we can pur- 
sue the subject further by reference. How- 
ever, our business is not to decide which is 
the better system of Botany, the Linnasan 
classes and orders, or the natural orders; if it 
were, Dr. Lindley's evidence might assist us 
in forming a judgment: he says — "Now I 
distinctly assert that, in determining the na- 
tural orders of plants, there is no difficulty 
greater than that of making out the genera 
on the Linncean system. In reality it is the 
same thing, only with a different result. In 
the one case it leads to the mere discovery of 
a name ; in the other, to the knowledge of a 
great number of useful and interesting facts, 
independent of the name." — "This," he further 
observes, " is so strongly felt by all botanists 
of any experience, that they never think of 
using the artificial system themselves ; they 
only recommend it to others." The most ex- 
traordinary fact connected with the publica- 
tions before us, is their similarity of titles, 
objects, and avowed purposes; not that we 
always consider the avowed purposes have 
any immediate connexion with real purposes, 
but between book writers and the public, as 
between the magic lantern and the spectator, 
there is a curtain on which is reflected just as 
much as the public is intended to see, while 
the exhibitor and his apparatus are in the 
back ground, or out of sight. Dr. Lindley's 
Ladies' Botany was published in 1841, and is a 
clever introduction to all the peculiarities of 
the natural system, just, by the way, as fit for 
gentlemen as ladies, though the title indicates 
that it was written for their use. There is a 
good deal to learn before Botany can be under- 
stood, and if forty people have to explain the 
same orders, and the distinguishing character- 
istics of each order, one must expect a good 
deal of similarity. But there are many ways 
of describing even simple things, to say no- 
thing of a complicated science like that of 
Botany. Dr. Lindley's mode of communication 
is by a series of letters, written in a free and 
familiar style, explaining, as plainly as they 
can be explained, all the peculiarities by which 
the many orders are distinguished. But he 
does not pretend that scientific Botany is to 
be learned by a hop-step- and-a-jump process. 
He says, " There is, however, no mistake into 
which the public are apt to fall much greater 
than the notion that Botany is a science of 
easy acquirement. Like all other branches of 
natural history, it is formed upon a close 
observation of numerous independent facts, 
and can only be understood as a science after 
long and attentive study. Nevertheless, a 
certain amount of it may be acquired without 
extraordinary application." The chief recom- 
mendation of the work is, that so far as you 
go, you gain information. The orders, and 
the genera of which the orders are composed, 
are one by one explained ; so that beginning 
with Banunculaceaa, you are made acquainted 
with the characteristics of the natural order, 
and of the genera which are comprised in it ; 
and then you are master, as it were, of that 
order. Whenever you find a flower, however 
strange it may be, you can tell whether it be- 
longs to that natural order, by several distinct 
features in the construction of the plant, the 
flowers, seeds, roots, or leaves ; and if it be of 
that order, you may also determine the genus 
by some other points with which your first 
lessons will make you familiar. Thus, then, 
although you will be totally unacquainted, 
perhaps, with the peculiarities of any other, 
you will be gratified so far as that one order 
is concerned. Proceeding with another lesson, 
you will in time master another of the orders; 
and as you store your mind with these orders, 
and the genera belonging to them, you will 
keep adding to the sources of pleasure to be 
derived from the study of Botany. We, how- 
ever, quite agree with Dr. Lindley, that the 
science of Botany is not easy of acquirement ; 
and were we disposed to cavil about the com- 
parative ease by which the two systems are to 
be acquired, we see but little difference. Nor 
do we admit, from all we have yet learned, 
that the natural orders will meet the difficul- 
ties of Botany more effectually in the end, or 
that it does do so in the beginning. The 
artificial system has been found deficient, be- 
cause no one goes on with it, or carries it far 
enough. There is room for more classes and 
orders, and the natural system will require 
additional orders, or (as indeed they see now) 
some of the present ones enormously stretched 
to make them subservient to new subjects, or 
rather subjects not yet known. We observe 
in both these works, evidence of the total 
abandonment of a notion once entertained, 
that the natural orders made a distinction 
between plants of a poisonous nature, and 
those not so. Indeed, if we mistake not, this 
