110 The Rev. P. Keith on the Classification of Vegetables. 



Exogenseand Endogenaeof M. DeCandoUe, — terms which are 

 substituted in place of the Dicotjledones and Monocotyle- 

 dones of Jussieu, though we confess that we cannot see the 

 utility of the substitution. The Exogenae are next divided into 

 Angiospermae and Gymnosperniae. The former seems to be 

 of a dimension too unwieldy, as containing the polypetalous, 

 apetalous, and diclinous plants of Jussieu, in no less than 165 

 orders, together with the monopetalae, in 61 orders more; 

 while the latter seems to be of a dimension too small, as con- 

 taining only 2 orders, making it nearly the same thing in prac- 

 tice as if they were all angiospermous still ; so that the pecu- 

 liarities which the subdivision involves, though important in 

 themselves, and founded undoubtedly in nature, do not seem 

 to us to be of any great utility as forming the ground of a 

 systematic arrangement, — at least, without having the larger 

 subdivisions subdivided again, into a sufficient number of 

 groups still smaller. The two main divisions of the Exogenae 

 are called tribes, and yet the orders belonging to them are 

 called tribes also. If this is a fault it is one that admits of an 

 easy remedy, which, we think, the term family would furnish. 

 The Endogenae are subdivided into petaloideas with minor 

 groups, and glumaceae, a subdivision which presents to our no- 

 lice nothing exceptionable. 2nd, The Cellulares are subdi- 

 vided into Filicoide.T., Muscoideae, and Aphyllae, which might 

 be a good enough division of the class provided it went by the 

 name of Acotyledonous. But as the Cellulares are presumed 

 to have no vascular system, we do not see how they can be 

 legitimately made to include the Filicoideae, the very diagnosis 

 of which is that they are ** flowerless plants, with a stem, 

 having a vascular system and distinct leaves*." The Vasculares 

 are the flowering plants, the Cellulares are the flowerless 

 plants. The antithesis is good in flict, but it can scarcely be 

 said to be good in expression. Flowering and flowerless are 

 not so happily opposed to one another as powerful and power- 

 less are, that is, the participle and the adjective, owing to their 

 grammatical peculiarities, do not form a neat or laudable con- 

 trast. We admit that this want of systematic symmetry is but 

 a mere trifle after all, though it ought not to have occurred in 

 the work in question. To evade the objection arising from the 

 vascularity of many of the Cellulares, it has been said that 

 they are furnished merely with ducts, but not with spiral 

 tubes. This may be all quite true, yet what are ducts but 

 vessels ? 



W« do not pretend to give advice to these able and emi- 

 nent botanits, knowing that nothing short of the experience 

 ♦ Introduction to Nat, System, p. 310. 



