44 SKETCH OF THE 



physicians are entitled to claim the credit of microscopical botanists. 

 If an invention should be made in 1857, by which microscopical ob- 

 jects could be examined without cutting them, or by which the observer 

 could dissect with certainty under a lens of 300 or 400 magnifying 

 power, the labours of the ablest microscopists of 1855 would become 

 as valueless as those of half a century ago, perhaps even of Grew. 

 Now this is not the case with descriptive Botany. The books which 

 first describe certain plants and tribes of plants, especially if accom- 

 panied by plates, executed from Nature, will always be consulted. 

 This I steadily affirm : and I never fail to point out to students who 

 aspire to gain a name in science, that the works of Clusius, Prosper 

 Alpinus, Dodonaeus, and the Bauhins are still referred to, because 

 they described and delineated fairly accurately the plants then known ; 

 while hardly anybody has ever heard of a certain Costaeus, who, at the 

 very same time, wrote on the organs and growth of vegetables. Swartz 

 and Jacquin, towards the end of the last century, were not perhaps 

 more distinguished men than Senebier and Kieser ; but the two former 

 have left excellent works on the species and genera then known, and 

 admirable plates of rare plants, and they are therefore cited and con- 

 sulted even at the present day. 



And now if we return to M. de Martius, and if we inquire what 

 will be thought of him fifty or a hundred years hence, the reply is 

 easy — according to the necessary and historical march of science. 

 He has published upwards of a thousand plates, all original, carefully 

 executed, full of analyses, and accompanied by admirable descriptions 

 and full information upon the localities and properties of the hitherto 

 unknown kinds. And he has thus guaranteed himself a lasting repu- 

 tation. The plates are as follows, in — 



Eeise in Brasilien 53 plates. 



Nova Genera 300 



Icones Cryptog. Brasil 76 



Eriocaulese 19 



Choix de Plantes du Jardin de Munich 16 



Palms 



245 



Flora Brasiliensis, fasc. 1-15 . . . 321 



Palmetum Orbignyanum . . . . '. 31 



Sundry Essays, etc. etc ? 



Total 1061 



* 



