308 HISTORY OF BOTANY. 



resemblances of plants beginning to appear. It is 

 impossible to explain the progress of such views 

 without assuming in the reader some acquaintance 

 with plants; but a very few words may suffice to 

 convey the requisite notions. Even in the plants 

 which most commonly come in our way, we may 

 perceive instances of the resemblances of which we 

 speak. Thus Mint, Marjoram, Basil, Sage, Lavender, 

 Thyme, Dead-nettle, and many other plants, have a 

 tubular flower, of which the mouth is divided into 

 two lips ; hence they are formed into a family, and 

 termed Labiates. Again, the Stock, the Wall-flower, 

 the Mustard, the Cress, the Lady-smock, the Shep- 

 herd's-purse, have, among other similarities, their 

 blossoms with four petals arranged crosswise ; these 

 are all of the order Cruciferce. Other flowers, 

 apparently more complex, still resemble each other, 

 as Daisy, Marigold, Aster, and Chamomile ; these 

 belong to the order Composites. And though the 

 members of such families may differ widely in their 

 larger parts, their stems and leaves, the close study 

 of nature leads the botanist irresistibly to consider 

 their resemblances as occupying a far more import- 

 ant place than their differences. It is the general 

 establishment of this conviction and its consequences 

 which we have now to follow. 



The first writer in whom we find the traces of 



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an arrangement depending upon these natural re- 

 semblances, is Hieronymus Tragus, (Jerom Bock,) a 

 ^laborious German botanist, who. in 1551, published 



