CLASSIFICATION OF MEDUS. 
op 
or 
and from that of Linnzus to the epoch of Robert Brown and Cuvier, are those of practical 
naturalists. In their names, and in the names of many eminent men, happily enrolled in the 
list of the Ray Society, I protest against the doctrine that naturalists (properly so called) are 
only to “record exactly what they see, and leave it to others to estimate the value of their 
facts, and to build upon them such inferences as they may think proper.”* 
Dr. Carpenter remarks, on the theory of Steenstrup, as follows: “ We regard this as a 
very premature, erroneous, and limited expression of the real facts; and shall endeavour, in 
the course of our exposition, to show what is the real truth of the matter. The proposition, 
in the form enunciated by Steenstrup, is totally inapplicable to the vegetable kingdom; anda 
strong suspicion of its incorrectness is suggested by that simple circumstance, inasmuch as it 
is chiefly based upon the phenomena presented by those tribes of animals which have most 
in common with plants in their general structure and history.” 
The reader of this passage might suppose, if he had not previously read Steenstrup’s 
Essay, that the Danish naturalist had not taken the phenomena of the vegetable kingdom into 
consideration when stating his proposed law; nor do I find in the review, although the 
phenomena of vegetation are abundantly cited in favour of the reviewer's opinions, any 
reference made to the fact, that Steenstrup had not only cited them in illustration of his theory, 
but regarded them as presenting the strongest evidences in its favour. The last passage of 
his concluding chapter—that ‘‘on the real nature of the alternating generations,” runs as 
follows :— 
“T conclude with the remark, that, inasmuch as in the system of ‘ nursing,’ the whole 
advancement of the welfare of the young is effected only by a still and peaceful organic 
activity, is only a function of the vegetative life of the individual, so also, all those forms of 
animals in whose development the ‘xwsing’ system obtains, actually remind us of the 
propagation and vital cycle of plants. For it is peculiar to plants, and as it were their special 
characteristic, that the germ, the primordial individual in the vegetation or seed, is competent 
to produce individuals which are again capable of producing seeds or individuals of the 
primary form, or that to which the plant owed its origin, only by the intervention of a whole 
series of generations. It is certainly the great triumph of morphology, that it is able to show 
how the plant or tree (that colony of individuals arranged in accordance with a simple 
vegetative principle or fundamental law) unfolds itself through a frequently long succession 
of generations, into individuals becoming constantly more and more perfect, until, after the 
immediately precedent generation, it appears as calyx and corolla, with perfect male and 
female individuals ; stamens and pistils—and after, the fructification brings forth seed, which 
again goes through the same course. It is this great and significant resemblance to the 
vegetable kingdom, which, in my opinion, is presented by the entfoxoa and all nurse genera- 
tions (amme), and to which I have alluded in the preceding Essay ; I might almost say, that 
the condition of continued dependence incidental to the animal life, is, to a certain extent, one 
of less perfection than that which is presented in the progressive elevation in development 
effected by the agency of the vegetative life.” + 
This remarkable passage had surely escaped the notice of the reviewer; for in it the 
ee Ocscite, Pear 
+ Ray Society’s Translation of the Alternation of Generations, p 114. 
