4 
PRELIMINARY TREATISE. 
nition founded upon facts incorrectly assumed, in consequence 
of an incomplete knowledge of the plants which it is reputed to 
comprehend. It is therefore the first necessary part of my 
labour to frame a new definition of the natural order, so as 
in truth to comprise the plants it contains; and my definition 
will be found to include some extensive genera which have 
not been usually placed under it. Of such I shall think it 
sufficient to point out the characters, without entering into a 
full account of the species which are numerous, especially in 
Ilypoxis, and not well known to me, but of which the details 
may be found, as far as they are ascertained, in the valuable 
and comprehensive work of Reaumer and Schultes. Before 
I can proceed to the execution of the task imposed upon me, 
it becomes necessary to consider what is that sj^stem of 
natural orders which has nearly superseded the Linnsean, or, 
as modern writers term it, the artificial system. It appears 
to me that a more gross misuse of words has rarely invaded 
any department of science, for if ever an arrangement was 
artificial, it is that now adopted of vegetable orders, the 
characters of which depend upon a variety of features taken 
ad libitum , and in many cases erroneous in consequence of 
insufficient information, and which when defined have been 
thrown together in a variable mass of confusion according to 
the successive notions of different writers concerning their 
affinities to each other, and which cannot possibly be placed 
in any natural succession, because they are like octagon, 
hexagon, pentagon, and other angular figures, coming in 
contact with each other at their various sides, so that some 
natural affinity must be torn apart when they are put in 
succession. If we refer to Browm’s valuable Prodromus 
and to Sweet’s Hortus Britannicus, we find the orders placed 
in different succession ; and even if the point of precedence 
could be definitively settled, which is not likely to be the 
case, it depends on opinion and not on fact ; nor can the 
arrangement be used for reference without an index ; for 
no person, unless very deeply versed in the science, can 
be expected to remember the relative position of between 
two and three hundred orders, or to come easily at the 
facts on which the arrangement is built. I must pray the 
forgiveness of those who are much more deeply versed than 
I am in botanical studies, when I venture to say that 
something better digested is requisite for a general system of 
botany. The Linnsean, with its imperfections, is an arrange- 
