ORDERS. 403 



sent at the same time ; for though the Orders 

 of the 14th and 15th Classes are distinguished 

 by the fruit, they can be clearly ascertained 

 even in the earliest state of the germen*. 



Tournefort founded his Orders on the fruit ; 

 and his countryman Adanson is charmed with 

 the propriety of this measure, because the 

 fruit comes after the flower, and thus prece- 

 dence is given to the nobler part which di- 

 stinguishes the primary divisions or Classes ! 

 But happily the laws of a drawing-room do 

 not extend to philosophy, and we are allowed 

 to prefer parts which we are sure to meet 

 with at one and the same moment, without 

 waiting a month or two, after we have made 



* An instance apparently to the contrary occurs in 

 the history of my Haslingia coccinea, Exot. Bot. t. SO, 

 a plant most evidently, both by character and natural 

 affinity, belonging to the Didynamia Gymnospermia, but 

 as I could no where find it described in that. Order, I 

 concluded it to be unpublished ; and was not a little sur- 

 prised to be told some time afterwards, that it was extant 

 in the works of my friends Retzius and Willdenow, 

 under Didynamia Angiospermia, by the name of Holms'- 

 kioldia, after a meritorious botanist. This last name 

 therefore, however unutterable, must remain; and I 

 wish the Linnsean system, as well as myself, might be 

 as free from blame in all other cases as in this, 

 2 d 2 



