LANDMARKS OP BOTANICAL HISTORY — GREENE 307 



We have observed Brunfelius suppressing so ancient and classic 

 a generic name as Chelidonium minus in favor of a new name, 

 Ficaria^ ; this presumably on the ground that the latter is short, one- 

 worded, and free from ambiguity. Cordus, as if intolerant of any 

 change that should relegate to synonymy so old a name, continues 

 the old binary in use, not deigning to cite Brunfelsius' Ficaria 

 even as a synonym. ^ 



Specific nomenclature, as far as Cordus is concerned, remains in 

 statu quo. All specific names are binary. There is not in him the 

 trace of a tendency to combine nam^ and description in one phrase. 

 No botanist of the nineteenth century was any further from that 

 than he. But he is no more careful than his contemporaries to 

 avoid the use of those meaningless things, the numeral adjectives, 

 as specific names. He has an even dozen species of Ranunculus, 

 and the names of three are R. octavus, nanus and undecimus. 

 The use of these cabalistic appellations, however, perfectly demon- 

 strates that he had no idea of any other than binary names for 

 species in genera that were more than monotypic. 



Anatomy and Physiology. Almost every page of original plant 

 description in Cordus bears evidence of his having been accus- 

 tomed to examine the interiors of organs. We shall hardly expect 

 him to lay any foundations of a science of plant anatomy; for he 

 knows nothing of any artificial aids to vision. The vegetable cell 

 will not reveal itself to him, nor anything else that is too small to 

 be seen with naked eye. But he makes sections of roots, stems, 

 leaf-stalks, fruits of all kinds, and even of seeds, and records the 

 anatomical aspects of them all. Neither Grew nor Malpighi, had 

 he lived at the time of Valerius Cordus, could have done more. 



One meets with these records of anatomic and physiologic obser- 

 vation only as distributed up and down the pages of the whole 

 volume and forming part of the regular descriptions of genera and 

 species; and they are so very numerous that one may here repro- 

 duce but a small selection of them. 



That stemless aquatic, the common European sagittaria, is a 

 large plant noteworthy on account of small size of the leaf-blades 

 and the flowers, in contrast to the great dimensions of the leaf- 

 stalks. The bulk of the plant as a whole consists of mere leaf- 

 stalk. It is certain that by way of enquiry into this matter Cordus 

 has dissected those leaf -stalks ; for the first clause of his description 

 of the plant is this: "Sagitta has triquetrous petioles, very thin and 



' See pages 182, 185 preceding. 

 2 Hist. PL, p. 122. 



