GREEK BIOLOGY. AND MEDICINE 



established practices in their cultivation. He 

 says that the '' male " and the " female " have 

 been distinguished with all trees, ^' the latter 

 being fruit-bearing, the former barren in some 

 kinds." '' 



" With dates, it is helpful to bring the male 

 to the female; for it is the male which causes 

 the fruit to persist and ripen. . . . The process 

 is thus performed: when the male palm is in 

 flower, they at once cut off the spathe on which 

 the flower is^ just as it is, and shake the bloom 

 with the flower and the dust over the fruit of 

 the female, and, if this is done to it, it retains 

 the fruit and does not shed it" ^° 



Without following Theophrastus further, I 

 will borrow a summary of his botanical achieve- 

 ments, or rather of his position, from one more 

 competent than myself: 



" I. He distinguished the external organs 

 of plants, naming them in regular sequence 

 from root to fruit, and attained in many cases 

 to a really philosophical distinction. M 



" 2 . He definitely set forth the leaf ho- 

 mology of the perianth members of flowers but 

 attained to no real knowledge of their sexual 

 nature. 



"3. He established the first rudiments of a 

 botanical nomenclature. 



[82] 



