Sect. IL] Botany. I77 



of tlie same family or genus. Hence, he lias ob- 

 served that they constitute good gaieric, but not 

 specific characters *. 



Sir John Hill, after much inquiry in ve^-etable 

 physiology, pubhshed, in 1773, a very extensive 

 workj which has been commonly called his Vegeta- 

 ble Sijstem, in which he proposes a method of ar- 

 rangement founded on the internal slructure of 

 plants. About the same time, M. Tillet, of France, 

 and the celebrated Spallanzani, of Italy, published 

 the results of their observations and experiments 

 on the organs and functions of vegetables, wiiich 

 have been generally considered as highly valuable. 

 Beside what has been done by these naturalists, 

 new light has been thrown on vegetable physio- 

 logy by professor Walker and Dr. Darwin, of Great 

 Britain ^ by des Fontaines and Vauquelin, of 

 France ; by Pontedera^ of Italy -, hy Sennebier, and 

 Saussure, senior and junior, of Geneva j and by 

 Plenck and Reichel, of Germany. 



But among the vegetable anatomists and physio- 

 logists who flourished towards the close of the 

 eighteenth century, Joseph Ga^rtner^ of Germany^ 

 deserves particular distinction. This great botanist 

 was born in the year 1732, and died in 1792. He 

 early devoted himself to the fruit of vegetables, 

 not only as a part of vegetable physiology which 

 had been too much neglected, but also as furnish- 

 ing one of the best grounds of botanical arrange- 

 ment. A method of this kind he exhibited in his 

 great work, Dc Friictibus et Seminibits Plantanemy 

 the first volume of which was published in 1788, 



* Barton's Elements of Botany, 

 Vol. I. N 



