PROCEEDINGS OP PROVINCIAL SOCIETIES. 311 



bearings, of the science for the first time. Pythagoras's volumes 

 published after his return from Egypt, whither he had travelled in 

 search of science, were noticed in connexion with the estimate of 

 the state of botany in ancient Egypt prior to the age of Aristotle. 

 The parallel between the views entertained by the favourite pupil 

 of the Stagy rite, Theophrastes, surnaraed, on account of his elo- 

 quence, '^ the divine speaker," and one of the ablest of modern vege- 

 table physiologists, was interesting as illustrating the reach of phi- 

 losophy, and the profundity which characterized the conceptions of 

 a practical sage, who propounded them, upwards of two thousand 

 years before the birth of Christ, to the intellectual chiefs of the 

 Greeks. 



The causes influencing the decline of the science, during the Ro- 

 man government, were alluded to, and the merits of the unjustly- 

 reviled Arabians warmly acknowledged, as the nation by whose 

 efforts the expiring embers of philosophical botany were kept alive 

 till after the dark ages, when it was again cultivated in the north 

 of Europe. With regard to medicine, philosophy, mathematics, and 

 literature, the Arabians were characterized as having proved '^even 

 as a Noah's ark of preservation, when each and every department 

 of general science, throughout a dreary night of centuries, was de- 

 luged in the sleep of the dark ages." 



Dr. Thorburn proceeded to show what were the objects of scienti- 

 fic botany : and that the being able to name ani/ number of plants 

 could not be said, properly, to constitute a knowledge of botany : 

 and, that one might have no ordinary pretensions to be considered 

 as a botanist, though unable, in a drawing-room or parterre, or 

 upon turning over the leaves of a hortus siccus, to name more than 

 a few specimens of vegetable nature. 



the well-directed sight 



Brings, in each flower, a universe tolight !** 



From the objects, the lecturer proceeded to illustrate the applica- 

 tions of botany to the arts, sciences, and purposes of civilized life. 

 By the French and Germans, applied botany is chiefly studied; and 

 the lead was taken and is kept by these nations in almost every ap- 

 plication of the science, as regards geology, agriculture, &c. The 

 art of transplanting large trees, so as to enhance the value of pro- 

 perty, and to communicate the appearance of an old family manor- 

 house, to newly-erected country '^ seats," constituted one of the 

 most prominent illustrations adduced at this part of the lecture. 

 The instance of the transplantation, by one of the governors of Brazil 

 - — Count Maurice of Nassau — of an extensive grove of cocoa-nut 

 trees, was mentioned; also, the similar, and occasionally successful, 

 attempts of the luxurious senators of Rome, of Louis the XIV. of 

 France, and of one of King Charles the Second's courtiers. 



The benefits derivable from sound theory in the arts, were next 

 considered, with the value of theoretical knowledge in economizing 

 time, &c. &c. Lastly, after a series of practical illustrations of the 



