Publisher's Synopsis
Excerpt from West Coast Botany, an Analytical Key to the Flora of the Pacific Coast: In Which Are Described Over Eighteen Hundred Species of Flowering Plants Growing West of the Sierra Nevada and Cascade Crests, From San Diego to Puget Sound
In a general way we designate the objects around us by single names. We speak of a stone, a wolf, or a pine; but to distinguish the kinds we naturally use two names, as lime stone, sand stone; grey wolf, prairie wolf; nut pine, yellow pine, etc. This 13 one step in classification, and the only one commonly taken. This natural plan of double names was adopted by the great naturalist, Linnaeus, who gave names to most European plants, as well as to many of this continent. He wisely gave the Latin form to his names, since that language (being the base of most languages spoken in civilized countries) is the natural source of cosmopolitan names - those truly common to all people. Botanical names, then, differ from so-called common names principally in form, and they have these decided advantages: they more exactly represent the rela tions between kinds of plants, and they are names that are common to people of all languages. In short, they are the true common names.
It is not true that botanical names are harder than local names. The most com mon of our ornamental plants are well known by their scientific names. No one thinks of calling the following botanical names hard: Geranium, Aster, Verbena, Petunia, Portulaca, Crocus, Phlox, Fuchsia, Iris, Magnolia, Oxalis, Azalea, Dahlia, Lobelia, Arnica, etc. Most people talk familiarly of Camellias, Callas, Begonias, Acacias, etc.; while our beautiful California plants, Clarkia, Collinsia, Eschscholtzia, Nemophila, etc., are well known by their proper names - at least, in other countries.
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