FORMATION OF SYSTEMS. 323 



the end of the sixteenth century, collected and de- 

 scribed many plants of that country, some of which 

 were afterwards published by Kecchi 24 . Barnabas 

 Cobo. who went as a missionary to America in 1596, 

 also described plants 25 . The Dutch, among other 

 exertions which they made in their struggle with 

 the tyranny of Spain, sent out an expedition which, 

 for a time, conquered the Brazils; and among other 

 fruits of this conquest, they published an account of 

 the natural history of the country 26 . To avoid inter- 

 rupting the connexion of such labours, I will here 

 carry them on a little further in the order of time. 

 Paul Herman, of Halle, in Saxony, went to the 

 Cape of Good Hope and to Ceylon ; and on his re- 

 turn, astonished the botanists of Europe by the vast 

 quantity of remarkable plants which he introduced 

 to their knowledge* 7 . Rheede, the Dutch governor 

 of Malabar, ordered descriptions and drawings to be 

 made of many curious species, which were published 

 in a large work in twelve folio volumes" 8 . Rumphe, 

 another Dutch consul at Amboyna 29 , laboured with 

 zeal and success upon the plants of the Moluccas. 

 Some species which occur in Madagascar figured in 



24 Nova Plantarum Regni Mexicani Historia, Rom. 1651, 

 fol. 



Si Sprengel, Gesck der Botanik, ii. 62. 



3K Historia Naturalis Brasilia, L. B. 1648, fol. (Piso and 

 Marcgraf.) 



!7 Museum Zeylanicum, L. B. 1726. 



28 Hortus Malabaricus, 16701703. 



!9 Herbarium Amboinense^ Amsterdam, 1741 51, fol. 



Y2 



