NTWOOD, _14th March, 1874._

Yesterday evening I was looking over the first book in which I studied
Botany,--Curtis's Magazine, published in 1795 at No. 3, St. George's
Crescent, Blackfriars Road, and sold by the principal booksellers in Great
Britain and Ireland. Its plates are excellent, so that I am always glad to
find in it the picture of a flower I know. And I came yesterday upon what I
suppose to be a variety of a favourite flower of mine, called, in Curtis,
"the St. Bruno's Lily."

I am obliged to say "what I suppose to be a variety," because my pet lily
is branched,[1] while this is drawn as unbranched, and especially stated to
be so. And the page of text, in which this statement is made, is so
characteristic of botanical books, and botanical science, not to say all
science as hitherto taught for the blessing of mankind; {2} and of the
difficulties thereby accompanying its communication, that I extract the
page entire, printing it, opposite, as nearly as possible in facsimile.

Now you observe, in this instructive page, that you have in the first
place, nine names given you for one flower; and that among these nine
names, you are not even at liberty to make your choice, because the united
authority of Haller and Miller may be considered as an accurate balance to
the single authority of Linnaeus; and you ought therefore for the present to
remain, yourself, balanced between the sides. You may be farther
embarrassed by finding that the Anthericum of Savoy is only described as
growing in Switzerland. And farther still, by finding that Mr. Miller
describes two varieties of it, which differ only in size, while you are
left to conjecture whether the one here figured is the larger or smaller;
and how great the difference is.

Farther, If you wish to know anything of the habits of the plant, as well
as its nine names, you are informed that it grows both at the bottoms of
the mountains, and the tops; and that, with us, it flowers in May and
June,--but you are not told when, in its native country.

The four lines of the last clause but one, may indeed be useful to
gardeners; but--although I know my good father and mother did the best they
could for me in buying this beautiful book; and though the admirable plates
of it did their work, and taught me much, I cannot wonder that neither my
infantine nor boyish mind was irresistibly attracted by the text of which
this page is one of the most favourable specimens; nor, in con