FORMATION AND ARRANGING OF A HERBARIUM. 
73 
flat and even. Some are for pressing them more, others less, but 
experience will teach what is proper as well as how often the papers 
are to be changed, without taking unnecessary pains. Lastly, when 
the plants are quite dry, put them into sheets of gray paper, without 
white ones between, for which there is no occasion, and thus is com¬ 
menced a herbarium which will continually increase, if there be assi¬ 
duity on your part with your knowledge, and at length contain a ve¬ 
getable history of the country. 
Specimens of Ericas, Brunias, and such like delicate leaved plants, 
are very apt to lose their leaves in drying, and very often after they 
are dried. The remedy in this case is to dip the specimen overhead 
into scalding water, and then to dry them, but not before a fire, pro¬ 
ceeding as above. 
Specimens of all plants excepting succulents may be dried in a 
few hours, by placing them between hot sand-bags, in a moderately 
heated oven. Specimens of all succulent and other mucilaginous 
plants are very difficult to dry on the above methods, owing to the 
abundance of sap contained in the stem and leaves ; but this may be 
remedied by observing the following mode, by which I have dried a 
great quantity of this sort. Provide some coarse brown paper for the 
purpose, and after arranging the specimen for drying, cover it with 
five or six layers of the same sort of paper ; then, with a well heated 
iron, proceed to iron the covering paper, till all the moisture is drawn 
out of the specimen. Sometimes the papers will require changing, 
and the iron re-heating before the diying is finished. 
It now only remains for me to speak on the arrangement of the 
specimens, after they are dried in the Hortus Siccus, which I shall 
do as briefly as possible. The herbarium should be a thick Volume 
of the folio size, composed of cartridge paper, well supplied at the 
back with guards, so that when the Volume is filled with specimens, 
the front may not he wider than the hack, which would be the case 
without them. There should also be four clasps on the outside edges, 
two on the front, and one on each end, with different links to keep 
the Volume close while filling, and when full. In arranging them 
in any particular manner, must be left to the person’s taste, some 
arrange them in alphabetical order, some by the natural system, 
some one way and some another. I have arranged mine by the 
Linnean classification, if arranged in any of these ways, all the spe¬ 
cies of one genus must be kept together, and not begin till a suffi¬ 
cient quantity is collected, but if promiscuously, they may be 
fastened down as soon as dried. When the arranging is fixed on, 
and a sufficient number on hand, proceed to fasten them down with 
