
          Recd [Received] Feby [February] 8th
Ansd [Answered] Aug. 23

West-Chester, Penna [Pennsylvania] Feb. 1. 1837.
Dear Sir,

Your favor of the 3rd ult. [ultimo], was received
on the 12th, being post-marked in Queen County, on the
9th. I am much obliged by your remarks on my
Euphorbia, although I had made out my description
of it, & sent it to the printer, before yours letter arrived.
I had room, & time, however, to allude briefly to your views
of it, in the [obs.?], as you will perceive. I thought it best,
under the circumstances, to call it E. nemoralis [euphorbia nemoralis], for the present.
I have been particularly unfortunate with respect
to the books which I ordered & hoped for, from abroad,
during my present undertaking. Kunth's Agrostographia
did not reach me until the printer was at the 
last form of the grasses; & De Candolle's 5th volume
came to hand precisely as the printer was setting up the
last of the Compositae! This I regret very much; as
I think De Candolle has improved upon Lessing, & is
moreover, (to me at least), more intelligible. If I had
received him in time, I should have followed him in
several particulars, where I now differ from him.

What a tremendous order is that of the Compositae!
In a letter just received from Paris, I am told De Candolle
has ten thousand species of that order; & that 1500 more
have just arrived from Eastern Africa! So we shall have
another volume [added: of Compositae] as large, at least, if not larger than
the one just received. My french correspondent, speaking
of the number of new discoveries, says "les botanistes en
sont effrayés!" I thank you for the copy of the Monograph 
of Cyperaceae forwarded, although I have not yet
seen it; but I hope to find it in Philada [Philadelphia] on my next
visit to that city. I have put up for you, as you will

        