The Tasmanian Flora PDF Download

Excerpt from The Tasmanian Flora This work is mainly designed to encourage junior students to take a general interest in the vegetable beings living in this State. In pursuit of this end technicalities have been reduced, descriptions and general information have been abbreviated, and economy has been studied in every part. The system adopted is that of Hooker and Bentham, the one that is at present in use in most English-speaking communities. Many efforts have been made in recent years to improve on this. The late Baron von Mueller designed a system that is at present used largely in Victoria, and partially in New South Wales and South Australia, but it is doubtful if any extensive change will be made until a scheme is presented containing such radical improvements that a prospect of reasonable permanence may be foreseen. The main objection to Hooker and Bentham's system is that it contains a section - the Monochlamydeæ or Incomplete - that really is a sort of dumping-ground for all forms that have no relations elsewhere. This, of course, is not as it should be. Here we have primitive forms that have not yet acquired the typical Dicotyledonous form classified with plants of a reduced character that once possessed that form and have evolved away from it. But the state of affairs is not improved by distributing the Incompletes haphazard amongst the rest. Students should always bear in mind that not only are the great groups of plants descended from types long since lost, but the smaller groups and Natural Orders are seldom related in direct descent, and therefore any system that undertakes to classify plants in linear succession must necessarily be arbitrary, and almost entirely erroneous. Mueller's arrangement, and a more recent system by Dr. Warming, of Copenhagen, will be found in the Appendix. Plants, other than grasses, that have established themselves since Tasmania has been settled have only in few instances received the attention of natives, but are placed in an indented position. Had convenience permitted, their descriptions would have appeared in smaller type. The Plates must not be looked upon as the work of the Printing Department; they are faithful copies of the author's drawings. Had the departmental artists been permitted to idealise them some departure from a faithful copy of nature must have resulted, besides which increased cost would have necessitated a considerable decrease in number, which may have been the reverse of desirable. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.