B O T A N Y. 



11 



History. 



~>. Pent.i; 



(i. llexapctali. 



7. Polv 



/Wr; Compost!. 



8. F.x flosculis regular^ 



9. F.x flosculis regularibus ct irregukribu.5. 



10. Ex flosculis irrcgularibus. 



I'/r>n:s Irrcgiilares. 



1 1 . Monopetali. 

 \'l. Dipctali. 

 115. Tripetali. 



14. Tctrapetali. 



15. Pentapetali. 

 Jt>. Hexapetali. 

 17. Polypetali. 



IS. Flores incompleti. Pmperfecti. 

 The subdivisions, to the number of 91, were found- 

 ed on the character of the fruit, according as it is na- 

 ked or contained in a seed vessel, the latter being far- 

 ther distinguished according as it is dry or fleshy. 

 Proceeding upon this method, which, though dif- 

 ficult in practice, from the variations in the flower, 

 is, of all others, the most simple. Rivinus, agreeably 

 to his original design, prepared a series of very excel- 

 L-nt engravings, accompanied with short characters, 

 part of which were published the same year, part in 

 the following, and part in 1699. Being however un- 

 equal to the expense of such an undertaking, he was 

 nt length obliged to desist, without being able to illus- 

 trate more than the plants with irregular monopeta- 

 lous, irregular tripetalous, and irregular tetrapeta- 

 lous flowers ; and to finish plates, which were not 

 however used till a considerable time after his death, 

 for those of the irregular hexapetalous order. The 

 system, thus imperfectly acted upon by the author 

 himself, was fully introduced by Heucher into his 

 Hortits fVittenbergensis, in 1711, and was afterwards 

 adopted by many of the German botanists ; and we 

 may be allowed to add, that whatever may bethought 

 of it in other respects, it has the merit of originality, 

 and may be considered as the first specimen of a pure- 

 ly artificial system. 



Along with Rivinus, we might have here taken 

 some notice of Christopher Knaut, a German, author 

 of an Enumeration of the Plants growing naturally 

 Va?::o!. rourfd Halle, in Saxony ; of Peter Magnol, profes- 

 sor at Montpelier, author of the Botanicum Mons- 

 pelieuse ; and of one or two other writers of inferior 

 note, who were advocates for system. But without 

 enlarging on what concerns their histories, we rather 

 hasten to observe, that the two systematic botanists 

 of this period, who deservedly rose superior to all 

 their contemporaries, and whose various and enlight- 

 ened labours had by far the most extensive and last- 

 ing effect on the state of the science, were Ray and 

 Tournefort. They were both men of very eminent 

 talents, and indefatigable industry. 



J >hn Rav John Ray, our countryman, not less known for his 



Bom Hi-jtf. piety and amiable manners, than his learning, in which 



Died 1705. he excelled all preceding botanists, was born at Black 



Notely, in Essex, in 1628. After passing through 



a course of preparatory study in Trinity College, 



Cambridge, he took orders in the church, and was 



some time settled as a clergyman in his native county : 



but having resolved to gratify his thirst for informa- 



tion by traveling, he resigned his li\ing about the History. 

 if the Uniformity Act, which we are told was L*~u~ 

 disagn-c:ib!i- to him, and afterwards spent some time 

 g different parts of Great Britain, France, 

 Germany, Sweden, and Italy, where lie paid the 

 greatest attention to all natural productions, and par- 

 ticularly to plants. He had already begun to shew 

 himself in the character of an author, by publishing, 

 in 1660, while he was yet a resident in Essex, a cata- 

 logue of the plants growing naturally round Cam- 

 bridge, digested in the order of the alphabet ; 

 and in 1670, some time after his return from 

 the Continent, having added much to his previous 

 knowledge of the Flora of England, by repeated ex- 

 cursions through various parts of it, he proceeded to 

 publish a work on a larger scale, entitled Catalogue 

 Plantarum Anglite, et insularum adjacenthan, tune 

 Indigenes, tune in agro citUas comprehendens. 

 Three years afterwards he favoured the world with 

 his Topographical, Moral, and Physiological Obser- 

 vations, made in the course of a journey through the 

 low countries, Germany, Italy, France, containing, 

 among other things, an account of many plants ga- 

 thered by him, which are not indigenous, or, at least, 

 which were known at that time to be indigenous in 

 England; and having thus committed himself to the 

 public, both on the subject of native and foreign bo- 

 tany, he continued through life to make it his lead- 

 ing object to render what he had begun as perfect as 

 possible. In 1688, accordingly having now extend- 

 ed his excursions into the more distant parts of our 

 island, and discovered a great many new plants, especi- 

 ally in Scotland, he published an Appendix to his Eng- 

 lish Flora ; and two years afterwards he republished 

 the whole, with an account of 250 additional plants, 

 under the title of Synopsis Metliodica Stirpiinn Bri- 

 tannicorum, regard being had in it, as we shall have 

 occasion to remark shortly, to the first edition of his 

 system. Nor was he less diligent in the mean time in 

 gathering materials from all quarters, to augment his 

 catalogue of exotics ; for besides extracting whatever 

 was to his purpose from the writings of the older bo- 

 tanists, he availed himself of the discoveries of his con- 

 temporaries duly as they came before the public, and 

 was thus at length enabled -to give it to the world, in 

 1694, in a very enlarged form, under the title of Syl- 

 logcs Plantarum extra Britanniam Nascentiunt. 



The work, however, by which Ray evinced at once 

 the immense extent of his learning and research, and 

 conferred the most signal advantage on the science, 

 was his General History of Plants, which may be 

 considered as a systematic enumeration, accompanied 

 with descriptions and remarks, taken chiefly from the 

 authors whom he had consulted, of the plants men- 

 tioned in the preceding synopsis, together with such 

 as were discovered down to 170-t, the year before his 

 death, amounting on the whole to no less than 18,655 

 species and varieties. The first vol. in fol. appeared 

 in 1686, the second in 1688, and the third, embracing 

 the later discoveries of Rheede, Herman, Sylvius, 

 Plumier, Camellus, Tournefort, and others, in 170-t, 

 the year above referred to ; and were justly received 

 by the world as constituting the most learned, judi- 

 cious, and elaborate history of the vegetable King- 

 dom, which had hitherto been offered to them. 



Having said thus much with regard to the labours 



