part has a substantive name of its own: shapes and other modifications
of an organ or part are designated by adjective terms, or, when the
forms are peculiar, substantive names are given to them. By the correct
use of such botanical terms, and by proper subordination of the
characters under the order, genus, species, etc., plants may be
described and determined with much precision. The classical language of
botany is Latin. While modern languages have their own names and terms,
these usually lack the precision of the Latin or Latinized botanical
terminology. Fortunately, this Latinized terminology has been largely
adopted and incorporated into the English technical language of botany,
thus securing precision. And these terms are largely the basis of
specific names of plants.

546. A glossary or vocabulary of the principal botanical terms used in
phanerogamous and vascular cryptogamous botany is appended to this
volume, to which the student may refer, as occasion arises.

Sec. 3. SYSTEM.

547. Two systems of classification used to be recognized in botany,--the
artificial and the natural; but only the latter is now thought to
deserve the name of a system.

548. Artificial classifications have for object merely the ascertaining
of the name and place of a plant. They do not attempt to express
relationships, but serve as a kind of dictionary. They distribute the
genera and species according to some one peculiarity or set of
peculiarities (just as a dictionary distributes words according to their
first letters), disregarding all other considerations. At present an
artificial classification in botany is needed only as a key to the
natural orders,--as an aid in referring an unknown plant to its proper
family; and such keys are still very needful, at least for the beginner.
Formerly, when the orders themselves were not clearly made out, an
artificial classification was required to lead the student down to the
genus. Two such classifications were long in vogue: First, that of
Tournefort, founded mainly on the leaves of the flower, the calyx and
corolla: this was the prevalent system throughout the first half of the
eighteenth century; but it has long since gone by. It was succeeded by
the well-known

549. =Artificial System of Linnaeus=, which was founded on the stamens
and pistils. It consists of twenty-four classes, and of a variable
number of orders; the classes founded mainly on the number and
disposition of the stam