32 ROBERT MORISON AND JOHN RAY 



Plantarum (1703) which displays principles of classification of 

 which Morison had no conception. 



The Tables of Plants does not illustrate any very definite 

 principles. It was a tentative production, written to order : in 

 fact, it appears (as explained in the preface to his Methodus 

 emendata, 1703) that Ray, in writing it, was not free to follow 

 what he really believed to be the order of Nature. It is interest- 

 ing, however, as being the first systematic work published in 

 England. The classification is based, to some extent, upon 

 the character of the fruit, a principle borrowed, probably not 

 from Morison but directly from Cesalpino. Before long it was 

 superseded by a much more comprehensive and ambitious 

 attempt, the Methodus Plantarum Nova, issued in 1682, two 

 years after Morison's Historia (Pars Secunda). 



Ray's Methodus Plantarum Nova, 1682. 



DE HERBIS. 



Genus i. Imperfectae, flore et semine carentes : Algae, Fungi. 

 ii. Semine minutissimo : Bryophyta, most Pteridophyta. 



iii. Acaules Epiphyllospermae, vulgo Capillares : Filices. 



iv. Flore imperfecto, sexu distinctae : e.g. Humnlus, Can- 



nabis, Spinachia, Urtica. 

 v. imperfecto, sexu carentes : e.g. Chenopodium y 



Alchemilla, Artemisia. 

 vi. imperfecto, Monospermae, semine triquetro : 



Polygonaceae. 

 vii. composite, Lactescentes : Compositae, Cicho- 



rieae. 

 viii. discoide, Papposae : Compositae, most Asteroi- 



deae and Senecionideae. 

 ix. discoide nudo, Papposae : Compositae, Eupa- 



torium, Senecio, Gnaphalium. 

 x. composite discoide, Corymbiferae : Compositae, 



some Anthemideae. 

 xi. discoide nudo, Corymbiferae : Compositae, the 



rest of the Anthemideae. 

 xii. ex flosculis fistularibus, Capitatae: Compositae, 



Cynareae. 

 xiii. composite, Anomalae : Dipsacus, Scabiosa, Echi- 



nops, Armeria. 

 xiv. perfecto, seminibus nudis singulis: Valeriana, 



Thalictrum, Statice, Agrimonia, &c. 

 xv, xvi. Umbelliferae. 



