BLUE LOBELLA, 87 
The genus was named by Linneus in honour of a 
remarkable man, who was one of the true founders of 
botanical science. Matthias de Lobel was born at Lisle 
in 1538, and was trained to the medical profession, under 
the physician Rondelet, in whose honour the fragrant 
rondeletia was named. Lobel, according to the good 
custom of his time, prepared himself for the business of 
life by travel, and in his wanderings he picked up a Tot 
of knowledge about plants. He settled as a physician 
at Antwerp, but soon after went to Delft, where he was 
appointed physician to William Prince of Orange. Some 
time after this, but at what date no one can tell, he 
came to England, and published in London, in 1570, 
his “ Novum Stirpium Adversaria,” the object of which 
was to investigate the botany and materia medica of the 
ancients. Now it is of the utmost importance, in con- 
nection with the history of plants, to bear in mind that 
this work contains the germ, and a large and good germ, 
of the natural system. Lobel grouped the plants into 
tribes and families by their affinities, which is the essence 
of the natural system; and it is somewhat surprising: that 
Linneus did not work on this basis instead of framing: 
his own artificial system, which, with all its ingenuity, 
is comparatively valueless even as an aid to the memory, 
although it becomes useful in spite of its inherent weak- 
ness of principle when it happens to agree with the 
natural system in the case of such groups as the grasses 
and the composites. 
Lobel was an industrious author and a consistent 
worker in the garden. Under the patronage of Lord 
Zouch he established a physic garden at Hackney, and in 
due time was appointed king’s botanist by James L., but 
