1 86 Morphology and Systematic Botany under [BOOKI. 



namely, how it is possible for the morphological affinity of 

 species in the system to be in so high a degree independent of 

 their physiological adaptation to their environment. 



The modern teaching on vegetable cells, modern anatomy, 

 and morphology, and the improved form of the theory of 

 selection are the product of inductive enquiry since 1840, 

 a product the full importance of which will be described 

 in the following portions of our history. At present we have 

 to deal only with morphological and systematic results, and 

 therefore with a part only of the abundant labours of the 

 botanists who will be noticed in this chapter ; the remainder 

 will be reserved for succeeding books, which contain the 

 history of the anatomy and physiology of plants. 



It is one of the characteristic features of this period of 

 botany, that morphology enters into the closest connection 

 with the doctrine of the cell, with anatomy and embryology, 

 and that researches, especially into the process of fecundation 

 and the formation of the embryo, form to some extent the 

 central point of morphological and systematic investigations. 

 A strict separation of these various enquiries, which are all 

 ultimately applicable to the purposes of systematic botany, can 

 therefore scarcely be maintained, and least of all in dealing 

 with the lower Cryptogams. 



The condition of botanical literature about the year 1840 

 was highly unsatisfactory ; it is true that eminent service was 

 rendered in the several domains of systematic botany, mor- 

 phology, anatomy, and physiology, and a number of von Mohl's 

 best works were produced in this period; Meyen also, 

 Dutrochet, Ludolph Treviranus and others were cultivating 

 vegetable anatomy and physiology, and it has been already 

 stated that good and noticeable work was done in the previous 

 years in morphology and systematic botany. But there was 

 no one to put together, to criticise and apply the knowledge 



