Excerpt from The Phytologist, 1845, Vol. 2: A Popular Botanical Miscellany

With respect to lists of plants my views may be peculiar, but I cannot refrain from expressing my satisfaction at the great decrease in the number of these transmitted to me for publication. I am not aware of the utility of these lists as generally published. Were they restricted to species of excessive rarity which had not previously been detected in the stations pointed out, I can easily conceive an interest attaching to such records, more particularly if they extend the geo graphical or geological limits of a species. Or, on the other hand, were such lists complete, as far as regards any precisely defined or geographically circumscribed region, a degree of value would certain ly attach to them. But they rarely possess either of these qualifica tions: a number of the very commonest species and a few rarities are usually given, whilst an equal number of equally common species are omitted, species, the absence of which would be a most interesting fact, and worthy of comment, but which are omitted only through want of care in the compilation, and neither on account of their uni versal occurrence, nor on account of their entire absence. Under these circumstances such lists appear to me scarcely truthful. The occurrence of such names as those of groundsel and chickweed leads one to suppose that all species have been included, or wherefore these And the absence of these names, while others equally common are given, induces the erroneous conclusion that the plants also are absent. I also find that in many instances, the names of rarities have been given without sufficient care, the plants often turning out to have been wrongly named or notoriously introduced.

I have again to acknowledge the obligation I am under to Mr. Lux ford for the great care displayed in his editorial superintendence.

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