BOTANY FOR LADIES;
OR,
A POPULAR INTRODUCTION
TO THE
ACCORDING TO THE CLASSIFICATION OF DE CANDOLLE.
BY
MRS. LOUDON,
Author of “Instructions in Gardening for Ladies,” “Year-Book ofNatural History,” &c. &c.
LONDON:
JOHN MURRAY, ALBEMARLE STREET.
MDCCCXLII.
LONDON:
BRADBURY AND EVANS, PRINTERS, WHITEFRIARS
PREFACE.
When I was a child, I never could learnBotany. There was something in the Linneansystem (the only one then taught) excessivelyrepugnant to me; I never could remember thedifferent classes and orders, and after severalattempts the study was given up as one toodifficult for me to master. When I married,however, I soon found the necessity of knowingsomething of Botany, as well as of Gardening.I always accompanied my husband in his visitsto different gardens; and when we saw beautifulflowers, I was continually asking the names,though alas! these names, when I heard them,conveyed no ideas to my mind, and I was notany wiser than before. Still the natural wishto know something of what we admire, impelledme to repeat my fruitless questions; till at last,vexed at my ignorance, and ashamed of notivbeing able to answer the appeals which gardenersoften made to me in doubtful cases,(supposing that Mr. Loudon’s wife must knoweverything about plants,) I determined to learnBotany if possible; and as my old repugnanceremained to the Linnean system, I resolved tostudy the Natural one. Accordingly I began;but when I heard that plants were divided intothe two great classes, the Vasculares and theCellulares, and again into the Dicotyledons orExogens, the Monocotyledons or Endogens,and the Acotyledons or Acrogens, and that theDicotyledons were re-divided into the Dichlamydeæand Monochlamydeæ, and again intothree sub-classes, Thalamifloræ, Calycifloræ,and Corollifloræ, I was in despair, for I thoughtit quite impossible that I ever could rememberall the hard names that seemed to stand on thevery threshold of the science, as if to forbid theentrance of any but the initiated.
Some time afterwards, as I was walkingthrough the gardens of the Horticultural Societyat Chiswick, my attention was attractedby a mass of the beautiful crimson flowers ofvMalope grandiflora. I had never seen the plantbefore, and I eagerly asked the name. “It issome Malvaceous plant,” answered Mr. Loudon,carelessly; and immediately afterwards he leftme to look at some trees which he was about tohave drawn for his Arboretum Britannicum.“Some Malvaceous plant,” thought I, as I continuedlooking at the splendid bed before me;and then I remembered how much the form ofthese beautiful flowers resembled that of theflowers of the crimson Mallow, the botanicalname of which I recollected was Malva. “I wishI could find out some other Malvaceous plant,” Ithought to myself; and when we soon afterwardswalked through the hothouses, I continued toask if the Chinese Hibiscus, which I saw inflower there, did not belong to Malvaceæ.I was answered in the affirmative; and I was sopleased with my newly-acquired knowledge,that I was not satisfied till I had discoveredevery Malvaceous plant that was in flower