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SCIENCE. 



[N. S. Vol. XII. No. 300. 



which has engaged attention from the very 

 earliest times. Without attempting to en- 

 ter into the history of the matter, I may 

 just point out that, speaking generally, all 

 the earlier systems of classification were 

 more or less artificial, the subdivisions be- 

 ing based upon the distinctive features of 

 one set of members of the plant. When I 

 say that of all these systems that proposed 

 by Linnseus (1735) was the most purely 

 artificial, I do not imply any reproach : if 

 it was the most artificial, it was at the same 

 time the most serviceable, and its author 

 was fully aware of its artificiality. This 

 system is generally regarded as his most re- 

 markable achievement ; but the really great 

 service which Linnseus rendered to science 

 was the clear distinction which he for the 

 first time drew between systems which are 

 artificial and those which are natural. Rec- 

 ognizing, as he did, his inability to frame 

 at that period a satisfactory natural system, 

 he also realized that with the increasing 

 number of known plants some more ready 

 means of determining them was an absolute 

 necessity, and it was for this purpose that 

 he devised his artificial system, not as an 

 end, but as a means. The end to be kept 

 in view was the natural classification : 

 ' Methodus naturalis est ultimus finis Bo- 

 tanices ' is his clearly expressed position in 

 the ' Philosophia Botanica. ' 



There is a certain irony in the fact that 

 the enthusiastic acceptance accorded to his 

 artificial system throughout the greater 

 part of Europe contributed to postpone the 

 realization of Linnseus's cherished hopes 

 with regard to the attainment of a nat- 

 ural classification. It was just in those 

 counti'ies, such as Germany and England, 

 where the Linnean system was most readily 

 adopted that the development of the natural 

 system proceeded most slowly. It was in 

 France, where the Linnean system never 

 secured a firm hold, that the quest of the 

 natural system was pursued ; and it is to 



French botanists more particularly that our 

 present classification is due. It may be 

 traced from its first beginnings with Mag- 

 nol in 1689, through the bolder attempts of 

 Adanson and of Bernard de Jussieu (1759), 

 to the relatively complete method pro- 

 pounded by Antoine Laurent de Jussieu in 

 his ' Genera Plantarum,' just 100 years 

 later. 



The nineteenth century opened with the 

 struggle for predominance between the 

 Jussiean and the Linnean systems. In 

 England the former soon obtained consid- 

 erable support, notably that of Robert 

 Brown, whose ' Prodromus Florse N'ovae 

 Hollandise,' published in 1810, seems to 

 have been the first English botanical work 

 in which the natural system was adopted ; 

 but it did not come into general use until 

 it had been popularized by Lindley in the 

 thirties. 



Meantime the Jussiean system had been 

 extended and improved by Auguste Pyrame 

 de Candolle (1813-24). It is essentially 

 the Candollean classification which is now 

 most generally in use, and it has been im- 

 mortalized by its adoption in Bentham and 

 Hooker's ' Genera Plantarum,' one of the 

 great botanical monuments of the century. 

 In Germany, however, it has been widely de- 

 parted from, the system there in vogue being 

 based upon Brongniart's modification (1828, 

 1850) of de CandoUe's method as elaborated 

 successively by Alex Braun (1864), Eichler 

 (1876-83), and Professor Engler (1886, 

 1898). It must be admitted that for the 

 last fifty years the further evolution of the 

 natural system, at any rate so far as Phan- 

 erogams are concerned, has been confined 

 to Germany. 



One of the more important advances in 

 the classification of Phanerogams was based 

 upon Robert Brown's discovery in 1827 of 

 the gymnospermous nature of the ovule in 

 Conifers and Cycads, which led Brongniart 

 (1828) to distinguish these plants as ' Phan- 



