370 HISTORY OF BOTANY. 



The difficulty of representing plants in any useful way by rueans o, 

 drawings, is greater, perhaps, than it at first appears. So long as no 

 distinction was made of the importance of different organs of the plant, 

 a picture representing merely the obvious general appearance and 

 larger parts, was of comparatively small value. Hence we are not to 

 wonder at the slighting manner in which Pliny speaks of such records. 

 " Those who gave such pictures of plants," he says, " Crateuas, Diony- 

 sius, Metrodorus, have shown nothing clearly, except the difficulty of 

 their undertaking. A picture may be mistaken, and is changed and 

 disfigured by copyists ; and, without these imperfections, it is not 

 enough to represent the plant in one state, since it has four different 

 aspects in the four seasons of the year." 



The diffusion of the habit of exact drawing, especially among the 

 countrymen of Albert Durer and Lucas Cranach, and the invention of 

 wood-cuts and copper-plates, remedied some of these defects. More- 

 over, the conviction gradually arose in men's minds that the structure 

 of the flower and the fruit are the most important circumstances in 

 fixing the identity of the plant. Theophrastus speaks with precision 

 of the organs which he describes, but these are principally the leaves, 

 roots, and stems. Fuchs uses the term apices for the anthers, and 

 yluma for the blossom of grasses, thus showing that he had noticed 

 these parts as generally present. 



In the next writer whom we have to mention, we find some traces 

 of a perception of the real resemblances of plants beginning to appear. 

 It is impossible to explain the progress of such views without assuming 

 in the reader some acquaintance with plants ; but a very few words 

 may suffice to convey the requisite notions. Even in plants which 

 most commonly come in our way, we may perceive instances of the 

 resemblances of which we speak. Thus, Mint, Marjoram, Basil, Sage, 

 Lavender, Thyme, Dead-nettle, and many other plants, have a tubular 

 flower, of which the mouth is divided into two lips ; hence they are 

 formed into a family, and termed Labiatce. Again, the Stock, the 

 Wall-flower, the Mustard, the Cress, the Lady-smock, the Shepherd's- 

 purse, have, among other similarities, their blossoms with four petals 

 arranged crosswise; these are all of the order Cruciferce. Other 

 flowers, apparently more complex, still resemble each other, as Daisy, 

 Marigold, Aster, and Chamomile " these belong to the order Com- 

 posite. And though the members of each such family may differ 

 widely in their larger parts, their stems and leaves, the close study of 

 aat'ire leads the botanist irresistibly to consider their resemblances as 



