54 THE FOUNDATIONS OF SCIENCE 



uses of plant organs. The sexual functions of the 

 ovaries and anthers were made clear by Camerarius 

 in 1694, while the following century saw a complete 

 system of classification worked out by Linnaeus 

 (1707-1778). 



Interest and curiosity about the animal world had 

 always been more marked than about plants, which 

 only attracted attention in so far as they were use- 

 ful or harmful in medicine or agriculture. From the 

 stories of Pliny and the anecdotes of beasts current 

 in the ancient world, some of which at least were 

 based on misconceptions or existed only in the 

 imagination, we pass to the Bestiaries, elaborately 

 written and illuminated in the monasteries of the 

 thirteenth and fourteenth centuries. Travellers such 

 as Marco Polo had brought back tales of animals 

 from India, China, and Africa, while the discovery 

 of America opened up a whole continent of unknown 

 animal and plant life. These stories were soon 

 followed by the capture and production of the animals 

 themselves, and natural history, from being too often 

 a collection of incredible marvels, took its place 

 among the recognised branches of systematic know- 

 ledge. 



In the seventeenth century the study of animals 

 was stimulated by the foundation of Royal Mena- 

 geries, while improvements in the microscope led first 

 of all to a more detailed study of cell structure, and 



