THE CELL THEORY 239 
appear, are yet composed of comparatively few elementary 
parts, frequently repeated”’; but we are not especially con- 
cerned with the remotc history of the idea, so much as with 
the principal steps in its development after the beginning of 
microscopical observations. 
Pictures of Cells in the Seventeenth Century.—The 
sketches illustrating the microscopic observations of Malpighi, 
AIRC 
Fic. 73.—Sketch from Malpighi’s Treatise on the Anatomy of 
Plants (1670). 
Leeuwenhoek, and Grew show so many pictures of the cel- 
lular construction of plants that one who views them for the 
fitst time is struck with surprise, and might readily exclaim: 
“Here in the seventeenth century we have the foundation of 
the cell-theory.”” But these drawings were merely faithful 
representations of the appearance of the fabric of plants; 
