JOSEPH DECAISXE. 459 



" Annales " he had published some good botanical papers, the earliest 

 in the year 1831. But his first distinction was gained by his ana- 

 tomical and physiological researches upon the Madder-plant, a mono- 

 graph containing the results of which appeared at Brussels in 1837, 

 and was said to be " one of the most able memoirs that has ever been 

 published on the physiological history of plants and their bearing on 

 practical cultivation and manufactures." Two years later, in connec- 

 tion with the chemist, Peligot, he published an investigation of the 

 anatomical structure of the Sugar-beet. His classical memoir upon 

 the structure and development of the Mistletoe appeared in 1840, and 

 is of purely scientific interest. In the year 1841 he showed that the 

 Corallines, which had been wrongly carried over to the animal king- 

 dom with the Corals and their allies, were genuine Seaweeds, dis- 

 guised by the incorporation of a great amount of lime into their 

 tissues. And about this time, in connection with his friend and 

 former pupil, Thuret, he discovered and illustrated the male organs 

 of the Fuci, as well as the mode of impregnation and reproduction, 

 thus initiating the investigations which, in the hands of the late 

 Thuret and others, have revolutionized phycology. 



Leaving these researches for his associate to complete and jiublish, 

 thenceforth Decaisne turned all his attention to ^phanerogamous botany, 

 morphological and systematic. Two orders were elaborated by him 

 for De Candolle's Prodronuis, Asdepiadacece and Plantaginacece, the 

 former demanding much minute research; he produced in 18G8 

 in conjunction with Le Maout, that admirable text-book, the " Trait^ 

 General de Botanique," profusely illustrated by his own facile pencil, 

 which is well known in the original and in the Eno-lish translation 

 edited by Sir Joseph Hooker. But the works by which he will be 

 most widely known, and which were connected especially with his 

 directorship of the Jardin des Plantes, are that incomparable series of 

 colored illustrations of fruits, together with descriptive text, known 

 as "Le Jardin Fruitier du Museum," and his subsidiary investigations 

 and publications upon the Pomacea: and their allies. These important 

 publications began in the year 1858, and were comjileted only a year 

 or two ago. 



Decaisne never married : he lived his simple and devoted life in the 

 house on Rue Cuvier in the Jardin des PLantes, where he died, re- 

 gretted and beloved, the last of the line of illustrious botanists — such 

 as Mirbel, Adrien de Jussien, Gaudichaud, and Adolphe Brongniart — 

 who were associated in the administration of this institution thirty or 

 fortv years ajro. 



