THE VICTORIAN NATURALIST. 23 



with the feeUngs of Augustin and Alphonse de Candolle deserve 

 such proud gratification with hopes so cheering for the future ! 

 When in 1839 the originator of their worldwide family-fame 

 introduced the next heir of his renown to the empire of science 

 (in the 7th volume of his universal description of the plants of 

 the globe) in offering the Campanulacese, it was with the wording 

 "auctore Alph. D. C. dilectissimo filio ; " — and when in 1844 

 the 8th volume of the " Prodromus " had to be issued by the 

 mourning son solely, it was in the following words : " Memoriae 

 suavissimae parentis optimi Alphonsus filius patria vestigia passu 

 licet non aequo persequutus pio animo dedicabat." But 

 Alphonse de Candolle, whose irreparable loss science has now 

 also to deplore, had already stepped youthfully forward with his 

 first independent essay in 1830, — a large monography, requiring 

 years of special previous research ; " and much earlier indeed 

 he had aided his father in annual notes on rare plants of the 

 botanic garden of Montpellier, where next month also Augustin 

 Pyramus de CandoUe's memory will be honoured at the 

 tricentennial jubilee of that celebrated university, of which he was 

 during a series of years in his specialities so great an ornament. 

 De CandoUe's " Prodromus" will for all time remain the chief 

 work not only for the specific description of the dicotyledonous 

 plants of the whole earth, but also for the detailed elaboration of 

 the Candollean system ; and this again in it| main features must 

 remain the scheme of classification for all futurity, — whereas the 

 permanent systematic fixing of the genera in their modern aspect 

 and now vast accumulation has fallen to the share of two British 

 authors, George Bentham and Joseph Hooker. Nearly twenty 

 volumes appeared of this " Prodromus " with the help of the best 

 investigators of each period. Since 1878 this unique work has 

 been followed by ten volumes of miscellaneous monographies of 

 Phanerogams, for which Alphonse de Candolle still furnished the 

 Smilacinse, — copies of the volumes being successively received by 

 the writer of this necrologe from the author's own hands. To be 

 actually a monographer of whole large orders of plants through 

 half a century stands as an unexampled feat in the annals of 

 science. But he had the further triumph, to see his accomplished 

 son, Casimir de Candolle, make his grand debiU several years 

 earlier by already monographing the Piperacese for the " Pro- 

 dromus," — that work throughout being written in Latin for use of 

 all nations in its originality. What endless information, what 

 unceasing delight has been afforded by this grand serial, and will 

 continue to be afforded ! The almost unparalleled literary activity 

 of him, for whom we now are mourning, gave further vent to multi- 

 farious other productions for the enrichment of science. Thus as 

 early as 1835 he issued his two large volumes, "Introduction a 

 I'Etude de la Botanique," for teaching purposes. Various publica- 



