24 ROYAL SOCIETY OF CANADA 



to France of very important collections upon which Tournefort based 

 his descriptions of many Canadian species. To the missionaries — Henne- 

 pin, who preserved the records of the ill-fated expedition of La Salle, 

 Charlevoix, whose statements of fact are to be taken only after careful 

 scrutiny, and Lafitau, who is chiefly notable for his having brought 

 ginseng into great commercial prominence — we are certainly indebted for 

 some of the most extended accounts of the vegetation of Canada during 

 that early period. But the work which commands special consideration 

 on account of its being the first distinctively devoted to the botany of 

 this country, is the "History of Canadian Plants," published by Cornuti 

 in 1635. 



A century later the physicians Sarrasin and Gauthier, attached to 

 the Court at Quebec, performed important services to botanical science, 

 and their names have been perpetuated in the genera Sarracenia and 

 Gaultheria. 



The explorations of Kalm and Michaux, as also of Menzies, greatly 

 enriched our knowledge, but such expeditions as that of Mackenzie in 

 1789, from which much should have been obtained, were barren of 

 results. 



It would thus appear that with the exception of Sarrasin and 

 Gauthier, who were actually in residence and who died here, and also the 

 missionaries Hennepin, Charlevoix and Lafitau, there was no advance- 

 ment in botanical knowledge from internal sources. And while their 

 work was valuable, it was not extended, and cannot be said to have 

 made any very profound impression upon the development of the science- 



The results attained by Kalm and Michaux, as also by Diéreville 

 and Menzies, all had their origin in, and were phases of the development 

 of botanical science in Europe. The same is also true of Cornuli's work. 

 î^evertheless. since the latter, together with Michaux's Flora Boreali, are 

 the two works which stand out with greatest prominence, as making a 

 distinct impression upon the development of Canadian botany prior to 

 1800, they may freely be regarded as the land marks of the s';ience in 

 the earlier colonial period, the one for the middle of the seventeenth, the 

 other forming a fitting close to the eighteenth century. 



The great land marks of the present century are to be found first in 

 that very noteworthy production b}^ Sir William Hooker, " The Flora 

 Boreali Americana." Although for excellent reasons this work fell far 

 short of the original design, it stands to-day as the best and only work 

 of its kind on the plants which belong distinctively to this part of North 

 America. Being based, as the descriptions are, upon material collected 

 by the various Arctic expeditions, by British naturalists on special mis- 

 sions, and by officers of the Hudson's Bay Company, it stands as an 

 epitome of all those labours which have accomplished so much in the 

 advancement of Canadian botany, but which were, nevertheless, side 

 issues in the development of Eurojiean botany. 



