TO THE LORD

VICE-CHANCELLOR

Most Vigilant

To the Heads of Colleges and Halls, to the Doctors,

To the MASTERS,

And to the other most worthy men of every rank or title, imbued with every kind of learning, his most munificent Benefactors in the University of Oxford.

It is the mark of a NOBLE man to confess (most sincere and learned Gentlemen) those by whose help he has made progress. This treatise on Umbelliferous plants Plants like carrots, parsley, or dill that produce flower clusters in an umbrella-like shape (umbels)., once conceived under the protection and patronage of the Most Serene Duke of Orléans Gaston, Duke of Orléans (1608–1660), a noted patron of botany., nurtured under the auspices of our Lord King Charles II, and finally brought forth under your protection, I now dare to make public property. Whatever this offspring may be, it would not have seen the light of day without your "midwifery" The author uses a metaphor of childbirth to describe the publication process.. For whatever light may come to the Botanical Literary Republic from this our new method of umbels, all those who take pleasure in botanical study must confess that it owes no less to your liberality than to our travels and midnight labors.

Called here by the favor and benevolence of certain among you, and admitted into your flock by the natural and ready inclination of some among you to benefit the Botanical Republic, I have no doubt that this occurred through the accompaniment of Divine Providence. We have encountered here men who are not only most learned, but also devoted to the public utility of the University; to them we inscribe and dedicate this new specimen, or treatise on umbels, constructed according to tables of kinship and affinity. It is indeed a slight gift, worthy neither of so great a Hero as the Chancellor Likely referring to James Butler, 1st Duke of Ormonde, then Chancellor of Oxford. nor of you, our patrons; nevertheless, we expect it to be pleasing to those skilled in the botanical art, and even to those being initiated into it, on account of its easy method.

We offer it to be surveyed and examined by everyone, both here among you and elsewhere in the world, to the end that those who are pleased by these efforts of ours may be made more inclined—by your example—to promote the remaining sections, which we promise to bring to light at the first opportunity, unless the labors of the designers or engravers Chalcographus: a copperplate engraver stand in the way; we ourselves are ready for action. In the meantime, let the doctrine of Umbels now go forth first under your auspices—restored, purged of the infinite errors and heavy delusions with which it has teemed until now, and reduced to nine primary genera. These have been established and composed by us based on the diverse form and figure of the seeds as observed from the book of nature, with their intermediate distributions noted and presented by the diverse appearance of the leaves, according to the rule prescribed by Nature herself, and not detected by any botanist before us until now.

If the Most Serene Royal Prince, the Duke of Orléans—the most sharp-sighted in botanical matters since Solomon—were alive today, this little work of ours would have needed no one's help, nor would our other forthcoming works have remained hidden for so long. But, alas! with so dear a Maecenas A "Maecenas" is a generic term for a generous patron of the arts or sciences, named after the advisor to the Roman Emperor Augustus. having passed away...