
          Troy. June 24th 1820.

Dear friend,

You say I ask you if you want things and then neglect
to send them. Now I do not recall any such fact. I always
send whatever I suppose you want and if you do not frequently
receive something, they [miscarry?]. I have collected a few
things in Berkshire county, Mass. which are new to me
and I will send them now, if I can find them. I will
go and look as soon as I finish this letter. I say go and
look, because, as I presume you have heard, we are all in confusion
here. My house was burned with the rest; and
though my books &c.[etc.] were saved they are scattered to the
four wings of the wind. Most of my minerals &c.[etc.] are in the
Lyceum; but my plants were at the burned house. I
cannot now find your last letter, therefore I may omit to [?]
some parts.

I wish you would make up your mind to give us a system of the
Cryptogamia of the Northern States. Suppose it should not
bo a compleat[complete] system, give us as first a little book,
and a small edition. Then increase and improve, so
that we may have an excellent treatis for a second
edition. If you were not over scientific, you could do
much good by writing a 12mo book of Cryptogamia,
somewhat on the plan of my Manual. I would
then leave out the whole of that class from a 
next edition, [added: and reduce the price one fourth or more] and refer pupils to your book. Most
students would buy both and bind them up in one 
cover. If you will say you will do it, I will promise and
send every thing I can find, and set all my students at
work, especially in Vermont. You ought to give essential 
characters in a middle-sized type and enlarged descriptions
upon the plan of Bigelow, [Baston?] &c.[etc.]in a small type.
But there is no need of so much open work as in Boston.
If you begin the work, you must calculate to finish
it. Not be forever promising it; though this seems to be
an essential characteristic of N.[New] York writers. for example
Hosack promised a treatise on Botany in 1805, [Eddy?] in 1815,
        