106 The Plant World, 



Darwin, but working quite independently, effected a veritable 

 revolution in the botanical world. Ilofmeister's principal work, 

 his studies on the comparative morpliologv of the Archegoni- 

 ates and Gymnospernis, which practically broke down the old 

 barriers separating "Cryptogams " and "Phanerogams," was 

 translated into English in 1862, and thus made accessible to 

 students in England and America. This work, im])ortant as 

 it was, seems to have had little immediate influence upon the 

 trend of botanical work either in England or America. 



Perhaps even more influential, especiallv as a teacher, was 

 the great Sachs, whose famous text-book forms an epoch in the 

 history of botany, and probably did more than any other single 

 volume to advance the teaching of the science ,not only in Ger- 

 man}-, but in England and America as well. In the vSachs' text- 

 book there was presented for the first time an adequate treat- 

 ment of the vegetable kingdom in its entirety, and although 

 some of his conclusions as to the relationships of certain groups 

 of plants are no longer held, his classification was an immense 

 advance upon any that had preceded it, and was a fairly success- 

 ful attempt, at least, to indicate the genetic relationships exist- 

 ing between the different main divisions of plants. 



The history of morphological botany in America ma\- be 

 said to date from about the middle seventies. At that time a 

 number of young botanists returned from Germany to America 

 and inaugurated courses in cryptogamic botany and morphology 

 which gave a great impetus to the study of what may be called 

 the biological side of botany as distinct from the purely taxo- 

 nomic aspect of the science. 



The establishment of a department of cryptogamic botany 

 at Harvard was an event of no small importance, and the long 

 series of important contributions to the morphology of the lower 

 cryptogams which has ever since emanated from the crypto- 

 gamic laboratory of Harvard University bears witness to the 

 high standards maintained at our oldest and most important 

 school of botany. About the same time that the department 

 of cryptogamic botany was organized at Harvard, Professor 

 Harrington of the University of ^Michigan, offered a course in 

 botany which was largeh of a morphological nature and was 

 the beginning of the large and well organized department of 



