CLASSIFICATIONS OF TIIE ORDERS AND GENERA. 
I. KEY, CHIEFLY ADAPTED FROM DR. LINDLEY’s ‘ VEGETABLE KINGDOM.’ 
II. KEY, ACCORDING TO THE LINN.EAN CLASSES. 
III. ARRANGEMENT AND CHARACTERS OF THE ORDERS ACCORDING TO 
THE NATURAL SYSTEM, AS ADOPTED IN THE PRESENT WORK. 
The following Keys are intended to facilitate the student’s endeavours to 
determine the names of New Zealand plants. I have tried to make them 
as simple as possible, by avoiding the use of more technical terms than ne- 
cessary, and by employing' in many cases characters taken from the general 
habit of the plants. None of these Keys can, however, be used, without 
some previous study of the elements of structural botany ;* for the terms 
employed have each an exact meaidng, which cannot safely be guessed at. 
The amount of study required depends much upon whether the student’s 
powers of observation and of reasoning are good and accurate ; but no. amount 
of ability will obviate the absolute necessity of observing the characters of 
plants carefully and accurately, and clearly understanding the application of 
the terms used in defining these characters ; and I would remind both teachers 
and students, that it is now a generally received opinion, that no subject is 
so well suited as systematic botany, to quicken the observing powers, and to 
improve the reasoning faculties of the young; and I believe that a little 
training in the use of these Keys alone, will sharpen the intellect of the 
quickest to a remarkable degree, and materially improve that of the dullest. 
So many New Zealand plants are variable, have minute or unisexual 
flowers, or are otherwise difficult of determination, that by one key alone the 
student may fail to find out his plant ; he must then try by means of the 
others ; but there are a few New Zealand plants, which, as it appears to me, 
no system of keys will enable an uninstructed student to find out ; just as 
there are idioms and expressions in languages that no grammar will teach. 
All plants are naturally divisible into two great primary groups -Flower- 
ing (Pheenogamic) and Flowerless (Cryptogamic). To the first belong all 
* These can be obtained from the excellent outlines of Botany by G. Bentham, Esq., 
P.L.S., prefixed to this work. 
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