have treated the subject differently. It appears to me, therefore, that an introductory publication is still desirable in this country, on an original plan, easy, comprehensive, and fit for general use, and such were the reasons which first prompted me to the undertaking.
When, however, I had proceeded a considerable way in its execution, I found that such a work might not only serve to teach the first outlines of the science, but that it might prove a vehicle for many observations, criticisms, and communications, scarcely to be brought together on any other plan; nor did it appear any objection to the general use of the book, that, besides its primary intention, it might be capable of leading into the depths of botanical philosophy, whether physiological, systematical, or critical, any student who should be desirous of proceeding so far. A volume of this size can indeed be but
