26 HISTORY OF BOTANY 



individual. The Historia Plantarum of the early days, 

 in which was discussed every aspect of plant life then 

 studied, became broken up into treatises on morphology, 

 anatomy, physiology, palaeobotany, ecology, and so on, 

 and each of these is, in turn, a compendium of the detailed 

 publications of workers who have devoted themselves 

 to the investigation of, it may be, quite circumscribed 

 areas of the field with which the subscience deals. 



Before undertaking a survey of the work accomplished 

 in the century following the era of Caesalpino I have 

 thought this an appropriate opportunity to draw your 

 attention to this subdivision of labour, so that you may 

 be able to note the birth of a new line of investigation or 

 the development of a new outlook. It is in the seven- 

 teenth century that we shall find that some of these new 

 sections first make their appearance. As the years pass 

 on the number of investigators increases by leaps and 

 bounds, until at the present time their name is legion. 

 It would not meet the end I have in view in preparing 

 these lectures were I to attempt to mention even the 

 names of all those who have contributed to the building 

 of the Theatrum Botanicum, as the old herbalist, Parkinson, 

 entitled his principal work. I propose to select compara- 

 tively very few authors, and if I omit many with whom 

 you have at least a bowing acquaintance you will under- 

 stand that it is not because I wish you to regard those I pass 

 over as unimportant contributors to the sum total of our 

 knowledge, but because I desire you to appreciate quite 

 clearly, in the first instance, the principal landmarks in 

 the history. You will be able to fill in the details for 

 yourselves when you have time and opportunity, and 

 when your own researches and more intensive reading 

 compel you to master the results arrived at by other 

 workers on the particular problems you may have set 

 yourselves to solve. 



