B O T A N Y. 



I.a Billar- 

 diere. 



History, illustrated, with much elegance, in Aiton's Hor- 

 v~ ' tus Kewcnsis, (a new edition of which has been just 

 published by his son,) and Smith's Specimen 'of the 

 Bulnny of New Holland, as well as in detached com- 

 munications to the Linnsean Society : and the business 

 of discovery, we understand, is still ardently pursued 

 in that part of the island called New South Wales, 

 which, from its being the seat of the British settle- 

 ment established in 1788, has naturally become so 



Caley. much the more accessible, by Mr George Caley, 

 who is there at the expence of Sir J. Banks, and by 



Paterson. Lieut. Col. Paterson, a distinguished traveller and bo- 

 tanist, who availing himself of the opportunities which 

 he enjoys from being on that station, has long devo- 

 ted his attention in the most laudable manner to the 

 investigation of its flora. 



The persons, however, to whom we are hitherto 

 under greatest obligation, for a specimen of the flora 

 of New Holland on a general scale, are James J. La 

 Billardiere, already mentioned, and Robert Brown, a 

 native of Montrose. The former accompanied D' 

 Entrecasteaux in his late voyage round the world, in 

 search of Peyrouse ; and has favoured us since his re- 

 turn home, with an excellent work on New Holland 

 plants, in 2 vols. 4to, illustrated with plates, which 

 he has entitled Novce Hollandice Plantarum Specimen, 



Brown. 1804, 1806. The latter, who now lives with Sir 

 Joseph Banks in the place of the late Jonas Dry- 

 ander, went out with Captain Flinders, of the Inves- 

 tigator, as surgeon and botanist in that expedition 

 which sailed from this country, if we recollect right, . 

 in 1800, and was for a considerable time occupied 

 in exploring more fully the coasts of New Holland, 

 began last year (1810) to lay the result of his re- 

 searches before the public, in the first volume of an 

 able work in octavo^ which he means to continue, 

 entitled, Prodromus Florae Novce Hollandice et In- 

 sute Van-Diemen. In this work he has constituted 

 several new genera, on the principles of Jussieu, 

 whom he acknowledges as his guide; and we may 

 add, that in the course of it, he has occasionally, 

 though seldom, availed himself, as we are informed in 

 the preface, of specimens in the collection of Sir J. 

 Banks, as well as of a few discovered originally by 

 hisTriends Paterson and Menzies, and one or two 

 others. Mr Brown, we have been told, has some in- 

 tention of making a voyage to the Caraccas, for the 

 purpose of discovery ; and much advantage, we doubt 

 not, may yet result to botany from his exertions in 

 that quarter. 



While the nature of the vegetable kingdom, both 

 at home and abroad, was thus becoming daily better 

 known, in consequence of the labours of those who 

 employed themselves in the way of general discovery, 

 there were some who directed their thoughts more 

 particularly to the elucidation of certain known, but 

 hitherto not well investigated or defined orders of 

 plants. And, by way of illustrating the success 

 which attended their endeavours, we might have here 

 appealed, among several other instances of the same 

 kind, to Koenig's masterly descriptions of the Mo- 

 nandrise of the East Indies ; Cavanilles's dissertations 

 on the Monadelphiae ; and the peculiar ability and 

 neatness with which Dr Schreber, and, we may add, 

 Rottboll and Host, have treated the subject cf the 



grasses. The investigations, however, to which we History, 

 refer at present, are those more especially which have ^~~ v 

 been pursued with the view of ascertaining thorough- th f" ' 

 ly the characters of that tribe of plants in which togamut." 

 Linnaeus was not able to detect the parts of fructifi- 

 cation, and which, from that circumstance, have come 

 to be denominated the Cryptogamiz. These, as it 

 is natural to suppose, became, from the first, an in- 

 teresting subject of attention to his followers ; nor 

 did the skilful assiduity with which they gave them- 

 selves to the task of exploring the order of nature, 

 and thereby endeavouring to fill up the blank which 

 had been left in his system, remain long unreward- 

 ed. 



The justly celebrated John Hedwig, a native of Tran- Hedwigi 

 sylvania, and professor of botany in the University of 

 Leipsic, directed his inquiries, in a particular manner, 

 towards the Cryptogamie plants, and succeeded, af- 

 ter a good deal of patient research, and with the aid 

 of very powerful microscopes, in obtaining a much 

 more correct idea of them than had been formed 

 by any of his predecessors. The discoveries which 

 he made, so far as they relate to the ferns, flags, and 

 mushrooms, are various and important ; and were 

 given to the world in a quarto volume, which ap- 

 peared at Petersburgh in 1784, with the title of 

 Theoria generations et fructificationis Plantarum 

 Cryptogamicarum. The service, however, by which 

 he did most good to the science, and secured the 

 most lasting monument to his own fame, was doubt- 

 less his distinguishing accurately the different parts 

 in the flowers of mosses, and thus correcting a mis- 

 take into which Dillenius, and after him Linnseus, 

 had fallen, in supposing the male to have been fe- 

 male flowers, and the seed capsules again to have 

 been the male flowers ; and his afterwards favouring 

 the public with works which bespeak so much in- 

 dustry, and in which such a happy talent for arrange- 

 ment and description is displayed, as his publications 

 relative to that order of plants. The works to which 

 we refer more particularly, are the Fundamentum 

 Histories Naturalis Muscorum frondosorum, which 

 appeared in 1782 ; the Descriptio et Adumbratio 

 Microscopica-analytica Muscorum frondosorum nee 

 non aliorum vegetantium e classe Crypt ogamica Lin- 

 ncei, which was published, so far as it was carried,, 

 between the years 1787 and 1797 ; and the Species 

 Muscorum frondosorum, which has been given to the 

 world since his death, by his favourite pupil, Dr 

 Swaegrichen of Leipsic. And these taken together, 

 we may add, constitute a history and description of 

 the mosses, which not only evince the discernment 

 and accuracy of a superior mind, but which have 

 had the effect of introducing a total change and re- 

 form in this branch of the science, and thereby given 

 a new impulse to the spirit of inquiry. To the me- 

 rit of Professor Hedwig in these respects, we cannot, 

 indeed, pay a better compliment, than by referring 

 to the authority of Dr Smith, who, after stating, in 

 his Introduction to Botany, the principles of arrange- 

 ment adopted by that eminent naturalist, has express- 

 ed himself thus : " Various ideas have been started 

 on this subject by Haller, Necker, and others, which 

 could only claim attention while it remained in great 

 obscurity. The excellent Hedwig, however, hae en- 



