Biographical Memoir of Michel Adanson. 11 



It has also been thought that M. Adanson, who was a pupil 

 of Bernard de Jussieu, had gathered from the lessons of his mas- 

 ter, the first germs of some of his families. But, were even this 

 conjecture well founded, his fame would lose little by the cir- 

 cumstance. If he profited by these lessons, it was as a man of 

 genius that he did so. The general plan of his book, — the di- 

 rect principles which he established, — his free and bold march, 

 are all his own, and present no indications of any thing borrow- 

 ed. The very existence of some errors which Bernard de Jus- 

 sieu had avoided, proves the originality of M. Adanson's work. 

 These errors always arise from the same cause, namely, the neglect 

 ol some important organ ; nor j^et were they owing to his having 

 established his distributions upon too small a number of partial 

 systems, for he commenced with making sixty-five of these sys- 

 tems, founded upon so many different considerations ; but they 

 owed their existence, as we have already insinuated, from want 

 of having rightly comprehended the fecund principle of the sub- 

 ordination of characters. These errors, however, are but few, 

 because a delicate tact often supplied what method alone could 

 not have given him, and the work presents in requital a mul- 

 titude of happy views, which more recent discoveries have only 

 confirmed. 



M. Adanson, for example, pointed out the perisperm, and 

 its importance for characterising the families, although he did 

 not give it any name. He formed the family of Hepaticoe, and 

 confined that of the Joubarhes within proper limits. He was 

 the first who perceived the affinity of the CampanulacecB to the 

 Composite^ ; the connection of the Aristolochia with the Eleag- 

 neoe ; of the Menyantha. with the Gentians ; and that of the 

 Trapa with the Onagnz ; of which Bernard de Jussieu was ig- 

 norant, and which have since been recognised. His divisions of 

 Liliacece, Dipsacea and Composit^e are original and good. His 

 groups of Fungi are superior to those of Linnaeus. He sepa- 

 rated with reason the Thymelcece from the EleagnecBy and the 

 Nyctaginem from the AmaranthacecE, which Bernard de Jus- 

 sieu had confounded. Lastly, a very great number of his genera 

 have been approved of and adopted by the latest botanists. 



In his preface, M. Adanson, gives a historical account of the 

 science, which displays an astonishing erudition, when we consider 



