No. 129.] 383 



by others, amoDg whom the most distinguished were CsesalpinuS; 

 an Italian J who wrote in 1583, the celebrated Tournefort, and 

 especially our countryman John Ray, who flourished in the end 

 of the seventeenth century. He had so clear and philosophical a 

 conception of the true principles of classification as to have left 

 behind him in his Historia Plantarum (History of Plants) the 

 real foundations of all those modern views, which having again 

 been brought forward at a more favorable time by Jussieu, are 

 generally ascribed exclusively to that more learned Botanist and 

 his successors. Ray, however, labored under the great disadvan- 

 tage of being too far in advance of his cotemporaries, who were 

 unable to appreciate the importance of his views, or the fitness 

 of his opinions ; and who, therefore, instead of occupying them- 

 selves with the improvements of his system, set themselves to 

 work to discover some artificial method of arrangement that 

 should be to Botany what the alphabet is to language— a key, by 

 which the details of the science may be readily ascertained. 

 With this in view, Rivinus invented, in 1690, a system depending 

 on the formation of the Corolla, (Flower j) Kamel,in 1693, upon 

 the fruit alone; Magnol, in 1720, on the Caly, (the outside cov- 

 ering of a flower) and Corolla; and finally Linnaeus, in 1731, on 

 variattons between the stamen (the male organ,) standing around 

 the centre of the flower, and the pistil (female organ) standing 

 in the centre. This method has enjoyed a degree of celebrity 

 which has rarely fallen to the lot of human contrivances, chiefly 

 on account of its simplicity and clearness, and in its day it effect- 

 ed a large amount of good. Lindley calls his system the natural 

 one. The work is in one thick octavo volume of 908 pages, con- 

 taining numerous drawings of plants and parts of plants. 



Addington B. Frye, being requested by the chairman to ex- 

 hibit to the Club some of his specimens of Algae (sea weed,) 

 presented a number of them prepared by himself, firmly placed 

 on drawing paper with perfect neatness and full and perfect 

 form. They were selected by Mr. Frye in the Pacific ocean, 

 within the last three years, from Panama to San Francisco. Mr. 

 F. is now engaged in a classification and nomenclature for them ; 

 his object is to make as entire a collection of them as is possible. 

 While Mr, F. was explaining the beautiful specimens, he men- 



