174 LAMARCK, HIS LIFE AND WORK 



ber of the French Academy, have been already 

 recounted. 



Lamarck was thirty-four when his Flore Frangaise 

 appeared. It was not preceded, as in the case of 

 most botanical works, by any preliminary papers 

 containing descriptions of new or unknown species, 

 and the three stout octavo volumes appeared to- 

 gether at the same date. 



The first volume opens with a report on the work 

 made by MM. Duhamel and Guettard. Then fol- 

 lows the Discours PrMminaire, comprising over a 

 hundred pages, while the main body of the work 

 opens with the Principes EUmentaires de Botanique, 

 occupying 223 pages. The work was a general ele- 

 mentary botany and written in French. Before this 

 time botanists had departed from the artificial system 

 of Linne, though it was convenient for amateurs in 

 naming their plants. Jussieu had proposed his system 

 of natural families, founded on a scientific basis, but 

 naturally more difficult for the use of beginners. To 

 obviate the matter Lamarck conceived and proposed 

 the dichotomic method for the easy determination of 

 species. No new species were described, and the 

 work, written in the vernacular, was simply a guide 

 to the indigenous plants of France, beginning with 

 the cryptogams and ending with the flowering plants. 

 A second edition appeared in 1780, and a third, 

 edited and remodelled by A. P. De Candolle, and 

 forming six volumes, appeared in 1805-1815. This 

 was until within a comparatively few years the 

 standard French botany. 



Soon after the publication of his Flore Franqaise he 



