BOTANY. 



History, or seed lobes ; the absence, presence, or figure, of the 



... ii y-".J flower cup; the presence or figure of the corolla ,- 



the position or union of the slamens ; the disposition 



of the flower, and the shape or situation of the fruit. 



The classes were as follow : 



Plantae monocotyledones, floribus distinctis : 



1. Palmae. \ 



2. Gramina. 



3. Lilia. 



Plants polycotyledones, floribus distinctis : 



4. Amentaceae., 



5. Umbellatae. 



6. Compositae. 



7. Aggregate. 



8. Tricoccz. 



9. Incomplete. 



10. Fructiflorae. 



11. Calyciflorse. 



12. Ringentes. 



13. Siliquosae. 



14. Columnifera:. 



15. Leguminosae. 



16. Oligantherae. 



17. Diplosantherx. 



18. Polyantherse. 

 Plantae, floribus indistinctis : 



19. Cryptantheras. 



20. Lithophyta. 



J. G. Gme- John George Gmelin, professor of botany at Tu- 

 lin. Died bingen, who had gone early to Petersburgh, and 

 A. D. 1755. 8 pent ten years in exploring Siberia, along with G. 

 F. Muller, de Lisle, and Stefier, proceeded, some time 

 after his return, to lay the fruit of his labours before 

 the public, in the Flora Siberica ; the principle of 

 his arrangement -being that of Van Royen. But as 

 he lived only to publish the first and second volumes 

 himself, (the former in 17*8, and the latter in 1749,) 

 the task of editor devolved upon his nephew, Samuel 

 Gottlieb Gmelin, who favoured the world with two 

 more, taken partly from the MSS. of Steller, about 

 twenty years afterwards. We regret, however, to 

 say, that the fifth volume of this very valuable work, 

 relating to the cryptogamic plants collected by Gme- 

 lin, has not yet been edited. 



Gleditsch. J nn Gottlieb Gleditsch, a native of Leipsic, who 

 tiled A. 0. died in 1786 at Berlin, where he was professor, and 

 had the honour of being an aulic counsellor, and 

 member of the Academy of Sciences, was another 

 botanist of this period who deserved well of the 

 science ; for, to say nothing of his miscellaneous writ- 

 ings, which are numerous and interesting, he distin- 

 guished himself in a particular manner by a treatise 

 on the mushroom tribe. He also proposed a system 

 of arrangement, which, though it has not, as far as 

 we know, been followed by any person, is yet enti- 

 tled, from its originality and elegance, to be noticed 

 in passing. 



The classes in it, which ate only five, were made 

 to depend on the insertion of the stamens, and were 

 the following : 



]. Thalamostcmonis, the stamens being inserted in 



the receptacle. 

 .', Pi-talostemonis, the stamens being inserted in the 



corolla. 1 



3. Calycostemonis, the stamens being inserted in the History. 



calyx. . v 



4. Stylostemonis, the stamens being inserted in the 



style. 



5. Cryptostemonis, the stamens being inconspicuous. 



Another botanist of this period, who differed from Haller. 

 Linnaeus in his ideas of method, and has a claim to Born A. D. 

 be mentioned with pre-eminent honour, was his illus- 1708. Died 

 trious rival Baron Albert Von Haller. This truly * 

 great man, who was the most general and accom- 

 plished philosopher and scholar of the age in which 

 he lived, was born at Bern, in Switzerland, in 1708 ; 

 conducted his academical studies at Leyden, under 

 the direction of a master, for whom he seems to have 

 cherished an enthusiastic attachment, the celebrated 

 Dr Boerhaave ; became professor of anatomy and 

 botany in the university of Gottingen in 1736 ; and, 

 after discharging the duties of his office there for 

 several years with uncommon reputation, retired to 

 his native city, where he at length closed arlife full 

 of honour and usefulness, in the year 1777, being at 

 that time president of the senate of Bern, and mem- 

 ber of almost all the literary societies in Europe. 



It is foreign to our purpose, in this place, to say 

 any thing of his transcendent merit as an anatomist 

 and physiologist j nor do we think it necessary to 

 follow him minutely in the detail of his labours as a 

 botanist. It will be sufficient to mention two or 

 three of his principal works, and subjoin the outline 

 of that system of arrangement which he exemplified 

 in them ; premising this general remark, that ability 

 is the characteristic feature of all he has written. 

 One of those works appeared in 1753, under the 

 title of Enumeratio Plantarum Horti Regii et Agri 

 Gottiugensis, and contains descriptions of several rare 

 plants. Another is his BMiotheca Botanica, in 2 

 vols 4to, published in 1771-2 ; which is a vast col- 

 lection, made with great knowledge and discernment, 

 of the names of all those who have written any thing 

 on botany, together with an enumeration, and for the 

 most part, a brief abstract of their works, arranged 

 in the order of time : And the third, which is per- 

 haps the most elaborate and perfect of its kind, and 

 may be styled, by way of eminence, his Great Work, 

 is his Historia Stirpium Helvetia; Indigcnarum ; 

 which appeared in 1768, in 3 vols fol. illustrated 

 with plates. The account which he himself has given 

 of it is the following : " Prsefatio compendium his- 

 toriae naturalis Helvetia: continet, et potissimum Al- 

 pium. Methodus mea est aliquanto perfectior, cum 

 classes superiores a staminum ad petala ratione repe- 

 titae hie in minores ordincs dividantur, plerosque na- 

 turales. Genera subinde a Linnaeanis diversa, no- 

 mina ssepe, plantae omnes ad naturam descriptae, 

 nonnullK 48 tabulis depictse. Subjecta est utilitas 

 ceconomica et medica-, breviter omnia, ut vix quid- 

 quam critics dederim. Plantarum numerus paulo 

 infra 2500, quern potuisscm leguminibus auxisse, 

 aliisque passim absque cultu provenientibus plantis 

 edulibus.. Nova: plusculae, et multae hie primum 

 defitiitae ;* potissimum in magnis generibus orchidum, 

 veronicarum, gentianarum, saxifragiarum, graminum, 

 iruscorum." 



The method adopted by Haller in the distribution 



