THE VEGETABLE KINGDOM 173 



somewhat immoderate language of Reichenbach "for a long 

 time the youthful interloper found no favour on account of his 

 having introduced in conjunction Scot Brown, Gray and the 

 still youthful Hooker the natural system of the hated French- 

 man ; where the more numerous disciples of Linnaeus had 

 thought to pass their lives in the glory of pondering and 

 admiring the great Swede." That Lindley was an early convert 

 to this innovation is also proved by the fact that his inaugural 

 lecture at University College startled many by its frank and 

 thorough expression of the superficial character of the artificial 

 system of classifying plants. 



The third and last edition of The Vegetable Kingdom consists 

 of about 1000 pages in small type with upwards of 500 illustra- 

 tions. It contains an historical review of the various " Natural 

 Systems " which had been prepared, beginning with John Ray's 

 (1703) and ending with his own, which is used in the work. 

 In this system Lindley divided plants into seven classes : 

 Thallogens, Acrogens, Rhizogens, Endogens, Dictyogens, Gym- 

 nogens and Endogens, and each class was subdivided into 

 alliances or groups of Natural Orders to which he gave names 

 of uniform termination, as Algales, Filicales, Glumales, Malvales, 

 etc. This classification, though ingenious, is defective, as the 

 author himself recognised. Though never adopted by other 

 writers this fact did not prevent Bentham and Hooker from 

 citing Lindley's work frequently in their Genera Plantarum. 

 As Mr Botting Hemsley observes, Lindley, who in all questions 

 of classification was both cautious and modest, seems to have 

 been an evolutionist without knowing it. Thus in the course 

 of discussion on the permanency of species he observes that 

 " all the groups into which plants are thrown are in one sense 

 artificial, in as much as nature recognises no such groups. As 

 the Classes, Natural Orders and Genera of botanists have no 

 real existence in Nature, it follows that they have no fixed 

 limits and consequently it is impossible to define them.... An 

 arrangement then which shall be so absolutely correct an 

 expression of the plan of nature as to justify its being called 

 the Natural System is a chimera." 



Owing to the fact that Hooker wrote the admirable and 



