3 88 HISTOR Y OF SCIENCE. 



Linnaeus himself had sketched an imperfect natural system of classi- 

 fication of plants, but abandoned the attempt to complete it. Ray 

 put forward a system founded on the natural method, but it was ne- 

 glected until JUSSIEU (1748 1836) developed it, 1789. The primary 

 divisions in Jussieu's scheme depend on the characters of the embyro 

 and of the petals, and on the positions of the stamens. 



JEAN-BAPTISTE-PIERRE-ANTOINE DE MONET (1744 1829), better 

 known as LAMARCK, was born at Bazentin, a village in Picardy. His 

 father intended him for the Church, and his education was entrusted 

 to the Jesuits of Amiens. On his father's death, which occurred when 

 Lamarck was sixteen years of age, the youth was free to gratify his own 

 ardent and cherished desire of bearing arms in the service of his country. 

 Lamarck began his military career with great brilliancy, and was very 

 soon made lieutenant. Fortunately for science, an affection of the 

 glands of the neck obliged him to submit to a surgical operation, and 

 to retire from the army. He was allowed a small pension (400 francs), 

 and he obtained employment at a bank in Paris. Drawn irresistibly 

 towards the study of nature, he used to contemplate the plants in the 

 botanical garden, and soon came to feel that in scientific discovery he 

 might find the path to a fame as honourable and more lasting than 

 any that martial achievements would confer. His own studies and ob- 

 servations having shown him the imperfections of the botanical system 

 then in use, he wrote a French Flora, with which Buffon was so pleased 

 that he had it printed at the royal printing office. This was in 1778, 

 and the following year Lamarck was elected a member of the Aca- 

 ' demy of Sciences. He was now engaged to write some volumes on bo- 

 tanical science, in the great "Encyclopedic Methodtque" of D'Alembert 

 and Diderot. At this time he depended chiefly upon his pen for the 

 means of subsistence, and, like many others in a similar position, he had 

 for fifteen years many difficulties to contend with. But when the great 

 Museum of Natural History was established, Lamarck was appointed 

 co-professor with GEOFFROY ST.-HILAIRE (1772 1844), who at twenty- 

 one years of age had been ordered by Daubenton to undertake to teach 

 zoology as far as regards the higher classes of animals. To Lamarck was 

 entrusted the Invertebrate class of animals, namely, insects, mollusca, 

 worms, zoophytes, etc. Lamarck, after a year of preparation, began his 

 course of instruction at the Museum in 1794. He then divided the 

 animal kingdom into the two great sections of Vertebrates and Inverte- 

 brates. While keeping the classification of Linnseus as regards the Ver- 

 tebrates, Lamarck in 1794 divided the Invertebrata into mollusca, in- 

 sects, worms, echinoderms, and polypes. In 1799 he separated the 

 Crustacea from Insecta, with which they had hitherto been confounded. 

 Again, in 1800, he distinguished Arachnida (spiders) from insects. 

 Later, in 1802, he separated Annelida from Vermes (worms), and 

 Radiata from polypes. 



Some works relating to physics, chemistry, meteorology, and geology, 



