446 



greatest abilities, and have rendered the greatest services 

 to science, independent of the accidents which made the 

 labours of others imperfect or abortive. Such men as 

 Ehrhart and Swartz were not to be satisfied with the ge- 

 neral productions of the fields or gardens to which they 

 had access. They had no resource but in the recondite 

 mysteries of cryptogamic botany, in the first instance. 

 To these they directed their microscopic eyes, and more 

 discriminating minds, with the happiest success. When 

 they had derived from hence an ample harvest, Ehrhart, 

 limited in circumstances and opportunites, hindered more- 

 over perhaps, in some degree, by a singularity and inde- 

 pendence of character, not always favourable to worldly 

 prosperity, opened to himself a new path. The native 

 trees of the north, and especially the hardy shrubs and 

 arborescent plants of the gardens, had not, as he judi- 

 ciously discovered, received that correct attention, even 

 from his master Linnseus, which was requisite to make 

 them clearly understood. Difficulties attending the study 

 of these plants, the various seasons in which they require 

 to be repeatedly scrutinized, and the obscurity or minute- 

 ness of the parts on which their differences depend, were 

 by no means calculated to deter this laborious and accu- 

 rate inquirer. He submitted the supposed varieties of the 

 shrubbery, the kitchen garden, and even of the parterre, 

 to the same rigorous examination, and, for the most part, 

 with the happiest success. His discoveries have not re- 

 ceived the notice they deserve, for his communications 

 were deformed with asperity and pedantry, and he did 

 not always keep in mind the concise and sober principles 

 of definition, which his preceptor had both taught and 

 practised, and to which he owed so large a share of his 

 well-merited fame. Ehrhart died prematurely ; but his 

 name ought to be cherished among those whose talents 

 have advanced science, and who loved Nature, for her 

 own sake, with the most perfect disinterestedness. 



The fate of Swartz has been far more propitious to 



