BOTANY. 



'History, cured several hundred phnts, wliich were not men- 

 tioned by the ancients, nor by any preceding writer ; 

 and having also made numerous experiments to dis- 

 cover their virtues, he was proceeding, with the aid 

 of eminent artists, to prepare a work on the subject 

 which might be worthy of the public eye. Unfor- 

 tunately, however, when he had got ready upwards 

 of 2000 very neatly executed figures, and was now 

 almost on the point of sending the fruit of thirty 

 years labour and study to the press, he was seized 

 with the plague, which was then raging at Zurich, 

 and died soon after in his Museum, where he had 

 been carried at his own desire, when he found his 

 end approaching, in 1565 ; having only reached the 

 age of 49, and being nevertheless, to use the words of 

 'I ournefort, the father of natural history in all its de- 

 partments. His MS S. relating to botany, though com- 

 mitted with particular directions to the charge of one in 

 whom he reposed confidence, were never made public ; 

 and those elegant figures, which he had left for the 

 purpose of illustrating his own works, were after- 

 wards surreptitiously made use of in several instances, 

 to adorn and recommend the publications of others. 

 Instead, however, of tracing their fate, or of pronoun- 

 cing any opinion upon what he did publish- on the 

 general subject of botany, which was not very consi- 

 derable, we rather hasten to add, that the prin- 

 cipal reason for our bringing him forward so con- 

 spicuously in this place, is, to present him in what 

 will ever be an interesting point of view, as the origi- 

 nal contriver of systematic arrangement. In the year 

 1560, this skilful observer, whom Haller elegantly 

 characterises, when he styles him, vir animo, Jabore, 

 ingcnioque pariter eximitts, suggested that, in order 

 to facilitate the study of botany, advantage might be 

 taken of the parts of fructification. That he under- 

 stood the doctrine of what is now called the sexual 

 system, and the necessary connection which it 

 supposes between the flower and the fruit, in order to 

 the perfection of the latter, we are not prepared to 

 say, because he never explained his ideas at any length 

 to the public. But still he knew, what long obser- 

 vation must have impressed upon his mind, that the seed 

 was necessary to the reproduction of the vegetable, 

 and was always preceded, in one form or another, by 

 the flower. And as these parts, besides being of 

 course the most essential and interesting, are at the 

 same time possessed of considerable variety, he, na- 

 turally enough, conceived that plants might be so 

 distributed into groupcs or classes, by characters 

 drawn from them, as to be viewed to more advantage, 

 and brought more readily under the command of the 

 mind for any useful purpose, than in the vague and in- 

 sulated way in which they had been hitherto treated 

 of. 



Proceeding upon this idea, Dr Andrew Cassalpi- 

 nus, a Florentine, some time professor of botany at 

 1CO3.' Padua, an d afterwards physician to Clement VIII. 

 at Rome, made the first attempt at systematic ar- 

 rangement. In his work De Plantis, published at 

 Florence in 1583, he distributed the plants, which he 

 has described in it to the number of 1520, into 15 

 classes, of which the distinguishing characters were 

 from ihe fruit. Hit classes were as follows : 



Cxsxlpi- 

 " us- 



1. Arbores, corculo ex apice scmiuis. 



2. ..... corculo a basi semiuis. 



3. Herbse, solitariis seminibus. 

 4 solitariis baccis. 



5 solitariis capsulis. 



6 binis seminibus. 



7 binis capsulis. 



8 triplici principle, fibrosx. 



9 triplici principle, bulbosx. 



10 quaternis seminibus. 



11 pluribus seminibus, Anthemides. 



12 pluribus seminibus, Cichoracese. 



seu Acantaceae. 

 13. .... . flore communi. 



14 folliculis. 



15 flore fructuque carentes. 



From this synopsis of the method of Cxsalpinua, 

 it appears, that he set out by making a distinction, 

 common enough long after his time, between trees 

 and herbs : and that he distributed the species of the 

 first grand division into two classes, according as 

 the corculum or germ is situated at the point ot the 

 seed, as in the oak, elm, ash, walnut, sumach, and 

 cherry ; or at the base of it, as in the fig, apple, ta- 

 marind, mulberry, fir, cypress, and juniper. The spe- 

 cies of the second grand division again he formed ir- 

 to 13 classes, according to the number of the seeds, 

 seed vessels, and the internal divisions of their ca- 

 vities. The third class, for instance, was made to 

 consist of those plants which have a single naked seed 

 only, as valerian, nettle, hop, and the grasses ; the 

 fourth, of those which have a single undivided berry, 

 or pulpy seed vessel, with several seeds, as cucumber, 

 honey- suckle, deadly night- shade, and briony ; and 

 the fifth, of those which have a single undivided cap- 

 sule, or dry seed-vessel, as pink, primrose, .swallow- 

 wort, and the papilionaceous flowers. The sixth 

 class, on the other hand, was made to consist of those 

 plants which have two naked seeds ; and the seventh, 

 of those which have a twofold seed vessel, or, in 

 other words, a seed vessel divided internally into two 

 cells, as mercury, speedwell, agrimony,and the stellated 

 flowers. The eighth and ninth classes were made to 

 comprehend those plants which have'a triple seed ves- 

 sel, or a seed vessel divided internally into three cells; 

 the plants of the former being more immediately dis- 

 tinguished by their fibrous roots, as convolvolus, 

 violet, and St John's wort ; and those of the lativ/i 

 by their having bulbous roots, as the tulip, hyacinth, 

 narcissus, and other species of the liliaceous family. 

 The tenth class was made to comprehend those plants 

 which have four naked seeds, as rosemary and sage ; 

 and the eleventh, twelfth, and thirteenth, those which 

 have several naked seeds : the ground of distinction 

 among themselves being, that the plants of the eleventh 

 class have what are now called radiant compound 

 flowers, as camomile ; those of the twelfth, either 

 what are now called semiflosculous, or discoid com- 

 pound flowers, as succory, or thistle; and those ot 

 the thirteenth, such simple flowers as are common to 

 all the seeds, as flos Adonis, herb bennet, and cinque- 

 foil. The fourteenth class was formed to include 

 such plants as have several capsules, or cells of cap- 



Mistorjr. 







Arrange- 

 ment iif 



