ne 
Christian Konrad Sprengel. 
EW men have been more in advance of the age in which they 
lived, or have suffered so long an undeserved oblivion, as the 
subject of this brief sketch. No mention of him is made in the 
Biographical Dictionaries, nor in the histories of Botany prior to that 
of Sachs (1875). Had not his discoveries been re-enunciated and 
extended by Charles Darwin, his name might even now be wanting 
in the roll of famous botanists. Very little is known about his earlier 
life. Born in 1750, he became Rector of Spandau, near Berlin. 
There, under Heim, he began the study of Botany, and became so 
enthusiastic over it that he neglected his duties as Rector, and was 
ejected from his post. He migrated to Berlin, where he supported 
himself by giving lessons in languages and in botany, and took up a 
lodging on the Hausvoigtei-Platz in a back room at the top of the 
house. ‘‘ Here,’ says one of his old pupils (from 1809 to 1813) 
in an enthusiastic account of him, in “Flora” of 1819, “‘[ always 
found him, in an old bedgown, with a nightcap and a long pipe, the 
room filled with clouds of tobacco smoke. He sat generally at the 
window, with a book or his herbarium. Shelves of books, his collec- 
tion of plants, and a few old household goods completed the 
contents of the room.” 
He goes on: ‘In figure Sprengel was well-built, rather large 
than small, lean, and raw-boned. His face was full of expression, 
the colour fresh, the glance vivacious. He wore his hair, which was 
prematurely grey, uncut, hanging about his shoulders. His gait 
was firm and upright; he walked fast, and, in spite of his age, went 
for half-a-day without rest. He was simple and frugal . . drank 
only water . . was never married.” 
Sprengel’s only contribution to botanical literature is his now 
famous work, ‘‘ Das Entdeckte Geheimniss,” which was published in 
1793, Just one hundred years ago. This book—of which more here- 
after—was too far in advance of its time, and met with a chill recep- 
tion, which did not encourage its author. Besides being despised as 
a visionary by the dry systematists of the Linnaan school who then 
held sway in botany, Sprengel seems to have been too fond of speaking 
the truth, regardless of consequences, and thus became very unpopular, 
