Eric Coates Palgrave (Author)
1977 First Edition
This book is in perfect condition with a dust cover protected by a plastic cover.
This book is still readily available online and in book stores, so there is no archival value in providing a scanned copy of a book that is in current circulation.
You may be interested in the 3-volume set by different authors that is scanned because of it's rarity.
Introduction
This book describes and illustrates all the indigenous and many of the naturalised, nonindigenous species of trees at present known to occur in South Africa, Rhodesia, South West Africa, Botswana, Lesotho, Swaziland and Moçambique south of the Zambezi River. The first, and perhaps the most contentious question that arises is, 'What is a tree?' This is a very difficult, indeed impossible question to answer for a tree' is a popular concept and not a scientific entity. Authors have had to draw up their own criteria which can be applied when deciding which species to include and which to omit. There are, of course, the obvious 'trees' tall specimens with comparatively large boles; it is the borderline cases which present the problems. In this book the widest interpretation has been given to the term 'tree', for it is the author's opinion that a low-growing plant, say 1 m in height but with a comparatively massive stem 30 cm or more in diameter, is just as much a tree as a plant 5 to 8 m tall but with many rather slender stems, each perhaps not more than 5 to 7 cm across. The evidence of any reputable collector who has recorded a specimen as a 'tree', even once, has been accepted. It would seem to be far wiser to include a few species which, strictly, should not be there than to omit one which a reader would expect to find in the book. The language has been kept as simple as possible and should be fairly easily understood by the layman; the use of botanical terms has been reduced to the minimum and those that are unavoidable are explained in the illustrated glossary.