HISTORY OF BOTANY. 



on the loves of gentle maidens ; as the blooming rose which adorns the bridal, and as 

 the gloomy cypress which guards the tomb. There are the microscopic mould, which 

 lends age to our mouldering ruins ; and the gigantic forest-trees which, in the penal 

 settlement of Norfolk Island, soar to the height of more than two hundred feet; or the 

 celebrated chestnut-tree of Mount Etna, which sheltered one hundred horsemen. 



They exist of every age, from the cell of the mushroom, which perishes in an hour, 

 to the hoary Baobad of Senegal, which is computed to have lived since long before the 

 days of Abraham. They quietly submit to the revolutions of centuries, with the changes 

 of clime ; and, as in the case of our own England, when the heat ceases to give life to 

 cocoa-nut bearing palm-trees, and tree ferns, they gradually and silently appear as the 

 modest primrose or the sturdy oak. They had traced long eras of the world's history 

 when no human being marked their form ; and they will, doubtless, bear testimony to 

 the progress of events until time shall be no longer. The antiquity of the blade of 

 grass is far higher than that of the noblest families. 



They have done essential service to their more highly endowed cousins of the 

 animal kingdom, by having, directly or indirectly, fed all and clad many. They have 

 formed the shelter of man and animals, and the chief part of the utensils and instru- 

 ments of the former since his creation ; and, even in our day, are presenting new 

 treasures of infinite value for his use, as in the India-rubber and gutta-percha, so 

 recently derived from their juices. 



Thus the objects of our investigation should lose no dignity when we remember 

 their remote antiquity, their universality, variety, beauty, and utility. 



The consideration of these objects constitutes the science of Botany a science 

 which may be more exactly said to treat of plants, their internal and external parts, 

 general and medical properties, geographical distribution, and classification. "We purpose, 

 in this essay, to limit our attention to the first and last portions of the subject viz., the 

 anatomy and classification of plants. 



History of the Science. The various considerations which we have already 

 adduced, may enable us to conjecture that this science, in its rudimentary condition, 

 must have existed from remote antiquity. If any further evidence short of direct 

 proof were wanting, it might be gathered from the pages of sacred history, in which we 

 find a constant reference to this division of created existences. The first authentic 

 records on this subject are connected with the Grecian and Roman eras, and extend as 

 far back as about the sixth century before Christ. The cultivators of the science did 

 not then receive the wide appellation of Botanists, but the more humble and restricted 

 one of Rhizotoma, or root-cutters; since they chiefly directed their attention to the 

 medicinal properties of plants. 



Aristotle, of Stagira, who lived in the fourth century before Christ, is regarded 

 as the founder of the science of botany; and from his days, through the Grecian, 

 Roman, and Arabian eras, down to the eleventh century, considerable additions 

 were made to their knowledge of this subject. Amongst those who cultivated this 

 science most successfully, we may instance Mithridates, and several Grecian kings, 

 with the younger Juba, king of Mauritania. These potentates established botanical 

 gardens partly, no doubt, from the love which they bore to the science, but in the 

 instance of some of them, at least, more with a view to the cultivation of the 

 deadly plants from which the poisonous juices were derived which killed Socrates, 

 and which, at that period, was not an uncommon mode of execution. Tyrtamus, 

 of Lesbos, who accompanied Alexander the Great in his victorious progress 



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