be found in plates v, xiv, xx, xxi, xxvi, and xxx: and others of the plates, to which no additions, properly so called, have been made, have been, in some measure, improved by the hand of the engraver. Plate i, in particular, is materially improved.

It now only remains for me to request a candid examination of this work by the public; and especially by those to whom the number and variety of my professional engagements, and of my literary pursuits, may not be known. It is a fact, that the work, originally begun and written in sickness, has been carried on to its present improved and enlarged state, in the intervals between my laborious attentions to the duties of my profession as a physician, and those as a lecturer on three great branches of science in the University; on MATERIA MEDICA, BOTANY, and ZOOLOGY; and while I have been occupied in attending to the printing of several other works, much more original in their nature, and from which I venture to promise myself a more solid reputation: viz. two distinct Flora, one of six of the states of the American Union*; one of the state of Virginiat: a work on the Geography of the North-American trees and shrubs; an elementary work on Zoology; and, lastly, a volume on the original, the migrations, the religious and political institutions, the languages, &c., of the Indians of North-America; besides some memoirs on minor or more individual subjects. All these works are actually, at this time, in the press: and some of them are nearly finished.

Prodromus of a Flora of the states of New-York, New-Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland, and Virginia: illustrated by plates.

+ Flora Virginica, &c.

To my Pupils, whether those who have been under my immediate direction, or those with whom I have had merely intercourse in my capacity of a public professor, I offer no formal apologies for the imperfections of this work. Most of my Eléves have manifested a disposition to view my literary labours with tenderness and candour: and from many, very many,-of them I have received acts of kindness, of friendship, and almost filial affection, which have constituted not a little of my happiness; and the remembrance of which,-if memory remain,—will not fail to cheer and solace me in the most gloomy walks to which I may be destined, in the remainder of my life.

March 27th, 1811.

ELEMENTS OF BOTANY.

PART FIRST.

"But not alike to every mortal eye

"Is this great scene unveil'd. For since the claims "Of social life, to different labours urge "The active powers of man; with wise intent "The hand of NATURE on peculiar minds "Imprints a different bias, and to each "Decrees its province in the common toil. "To some she taught the fabric of the sphere, "The changeful moon, the circuit of the stars, "The golden zones of heaven: to some she gave "To weigh the moment of eternal things, "Of time, and space, and fate's unbroken chain, "And will's quick impulse: OTHERS BY THE HAND "SHE LED O'ER VALES AND MOUNTAINS, TO EXPLORE "WHAT HEALING VIRTUE SWELLS THE TENDER VEINS “OF HERBS AND FLOWERS; OR WHAT THE BEAMS OF MORN "DRAW FORTH, DISTILLING FROM THE CLIFTED RIND "IN BALMY TEARS. But some to higher hopes

"Were destin'd.".

THE PLEASURES OF IMAGINATION.

Book I. 1. 79---97.

ELEMENTS OF BOTANY.

"Nec dubitamus, multa esse, quæ & nos præterierint. HOMINES ENIM SUMUS & OCCUPATI OFFICIIS."

C. PLINII SECUNDI
Naturalis Historia Lib. I.

LINNÆUS has made a general division of the plant, or vegetable, into three parts, viz. the RADIX, the HERBA, and the FRUCTIFICATIO. Of each of these parts, and of their various subordinate divisions, I shall speak in the order in which I have mentioned them. I prefer this order in treating my subject, as being more natural, or at least more facile and more simple, than that of those writers who begin their delineation of vegetables with an account of the fructification. In the very commencement of my subject, at least, I follow the "SWEDISH SAGE"*.

SECTION I.

OF THE ROOT.

THE Radix, or Root, is the lower part of the vege table, which is generally attached to the earth, from which it derives various nutritious principles, which it

* See his Philosophia Botanica, &c. p. 37.