22 INTRODUCTION 



the graves of the men they were intended to 

 commemorate forever. 



Thus, in letters of Conrad Gesner, 8 the Swiss 

 naturalist, it is shown that, had he lived to finish 

 his Histoire des Plantes, he would have perpetu- 

 ated the names of many friends, as he asked them 

 Bauhin among the number to choose among 

 his newly found plants for a namesake or to allow 

 him the pleasure of choosing for them. 



Clusius, 4 himself known as Clusia (Plumier), 

 " called the Contrayerva of the shops B Drakena 

 in honor of his great friend Sir Francis Drake," 

 and for a long time mutual compliments of this 

 kind followed, Tournefort, 6 Plumier, 7 and Peti- 

 ver, 8 being specially given to the practice. In 

 Plumier's Nova Plantarum Genera, 1703, giving 

 a description of 106 new genera he names some 

 50 after well-known botanists, seven of them Eng- 

 lish: Gerardia, Morisonia, Parkinsonia, Peti- 

 veria, Plukenetia, Sloanea, Turnera. 



John Lindley, writing in his Vegetable King- 

 dom (1846), remarks that: " Since the days of 



8 Conrad Gesner (1516-1565). Opera Eotantca, 1753-1759. 



4 Charles de PEcluse, 1526-1609, celebrated doctor and botanist. 



6 Dorstenia Contrayerva. (Used to be mixed with crab's eyes, as a 

 remedy.) 



"Joseph Pitton de Tournefort, 1656-1708, royal botanist, 1683. 



7 Charles Plumier, 1646-1704, scientist and botanist. Description 

 des Plantes de L'Amerique, 1695. 



8 James Petiver, M. D., 1660-1718, doctor and botanist. Pteriaraphia 

 Americana . . . . , 1713, 



