| Note: | Images of the original pages are available through Internet Archive. See https://archive.org/details/waysidewoodlandb00stepuoft |
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The purpose of this volume is to assist a very large andincreasing class of persons who possess a strong love offlowers, but to whom the ordinary “Floras”—indispensable asthey are to the scientific botanist—are as books written in anunknown tongue. With the enormous increase of our townpopulations, and the greater facilities for home travel, therehas grown up a truer appreciation of the country and of allthat is beautiful in nature; and it is hoped that this work maybe of service to those who thus steal back to the arms of theirMother, but have not time or inclination to spell out and painfullytranslate the carefully-made terms of the exact descriptionswhich learned men have written for the use of thescientific student. Such terms are absolutely necessary, forthe things they describe were unknown to our Celtic andSaxon forefathers, who would otherwise have left us names forthem which would now be familiar words to all. In a worklike the present such words could not be entirely avoided, butthey have been used sparingly, and in a manner that will notinvolve continual reference to a dictionary of scientific terms.vi
The Author’s aim has been to write a book that, whilst itsatisfied the rambler who merely wishes to identify the flowersby his path, might also serve as a stepping-stone to the florasof Hooker, Bentham, and Boswell-Syme; so that should theinterest of any reader be sufficiently awakened he may take upthe more serious study of either of these authors withouthaving to unlearn what this modest pocket-book may havetaught him. At the same time he will here find information onmany points of great interest, such as are rarely, if ever,noticed in the “Floras.”
When it is stated that the “London Catalogue of BritishPlants”—meaning only the flowering plants and ferns—includesnearly 1,700 species, it will be understood that an inexpensivework for the pocket of the rambler can only givefigures of a few of these; but the Author has tried to so usethe 180 plants delineated that they may serve as a key to amuch greater number o