330 



themselves, and no less evidently distinct from all others." — Intro- 

 duction to Botany, ed. 6, p. 288. 



The great misfortune with the author of the ' Observations,' and 

 others who have written in disparagement of what are called natural 

 orders, seems ever to have consisted in an utter inability to compre- 

 Tiend the impossibility of representing upon paper the manifold rami- 

 fications of all such groups of plants, and their inosculation with 

 others. Such objectors seem to suppose that the boundaries of 

 every group may and ought to be laid down with as much certainty 

 and exactness as the boundary lines of an estate upon a map. All 

 true botanists, from the days of Linnaeus downwards, have, on the 

 contrary, been compelled to acknowledge that this is far from being the 

 case ; and they have accordingly directed their labours to the investi- 

 gation of the natural affinities of plants, not without a hope that 

 eventually something of Nature's plan of arrangement might be dis- 

 covered. Linnaeus long ago declared " Natura non facit saltus," — 

 that she has no abrupt leaps from one being or group of beings to 

 another, but that all demonstrate an affinity with others, like terri- 

 tories depicted in a geographical map : and Sir J. Smith, in the pas- 

 sage immediately following that we have quoted above, goes on to 

 say, with great truth, that 



" If the whole vegetable kingdom could with equal facility be dis- 

 tributed into tribes or classes, the study of Botany on such a plan 

 would be no less easy than satisfactory. But as we proceed in this 

 path, we soon find ourselves in a labyrinth. The natural orders and 

 families of plants, so far from being connected in a regular series, ap- 

 proach one another by so many points, as to bewilder instead of 

 directing us. We may seize some striking combinations and ana- 

 logies ; but the further we proceed, the more we become sensible 

 that, even if we had the whole vegetable world before us at one view, 

 our knowledge must be imperfect, and that our ' genius ' is certainly 

 not * equal to the majesty of Nature.' " — Introduction to Botany, p. 

 289. 



Dr. Lindley, in the Introduction to his ' Vegetable Kingdom,' has 

 still more strongly insisted upon this ; and as we think he hais by his 

 illustration placed the matter in a clear light, we must be allowed to 

 quote the passage. He states that 



" No absolute limits, in fact, exist, by which groups of plants can 

 be circumscribed. They pass into each other by insensible grada- 

 tions, and every group has apparently some species which assumes in 

 part the structuj^-e of some other group. Two countries are separated. 



