352 HISTORY OF BOTANY. 



stance which gave the main currency to the system 

 of Linnaeus was, its physiological signification: it 

 was the Sexual System. The relation of the parts 

 to which it directed the attention, interested both 

 the philosophical faculty and the imagination. And 

 when, soon after the system had become familiar in 

 our own country, the poet of The Botanic Garden 

 peopled the bell of every flower with "Nymphs" and 

 " Swains," his imagery was felt to be by no means 

 forced and far-fetched. 



The history of the doctrine of the sexes of 

 plants, as a point of physiology, does not belong to 

 this place ; and the Linnsean system of classification 

 need not be longer dwelt upon for our present pur- 

 pose. I will only explain a little further what has 

 been said, that it is, up to a certain point, a natural 

 system. Several of Linnseus's classes are, in a great 

 measure, natural associations, kept together in vio- 

 lation of his own artificial rules. Thus the class 

 Diadelphia, in which, by the system, the filaments 

 of the stamina should be bound together in two 

 parcels, does, in fact, contain many genera which 

 are monadelphous, the filaments of the stamina 

 all cohering so as to form one bundle only; as in 

 Genista, Spartium, Anthyllis, Lupinus, &c. And 

 why is this violation of rule? Precisely because 

 these genera all belong to the natural tribe of Papi- 

 lionaceous plants, which the author of the system 

 could not prevail upon himself to tear asunder. Yet 

 in other cases Linnaeus was true to his system, to 



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