308 



HISTORY OF BOTANY, 



tany. We possess a work of his called Phytobasanos, pub- 

 lished at Naples, 1592, and another denominated Ecphrasis 

 Stirpium, published at Rome, 1616, in quarto, in which the 

 drawings of plants, after the model of Gesner, are connected 

 with representations of the parts of fructification. 



The knowledge of Indian plants was promoted in the six- 

 teenth century, by the victories of the PSrtuguese ; and the 

 two Portuguese physicians at Goa, Garcia ab Orto, and 

 Christopher da Costa, published accounts of many medicinal 

 plants, which Clusius translated in his Exoticis, printed at 

 Antwerp, in folio, 1605. 



The discovery of America also unexpectedly enriched the 

 science, and the Spanish governor in the West Indies, Gon- 

 zalo Hernandez Oviedo, was the first to give a proof of the 

 advantages thus obtained. 



The east was investigated by Peter Belon, who was sent to 

 travel at the expence of the Cardinal Tournon ; by Leonhard 

 Hauwolf, and by Prosper Alpinus, professor at Padua, who 

 died in 1617. The observations of the first of these are 

 translated in the Exoticis of Clusius. Rauwolfs Travels 

 were printed in German, at Lauingen, 158S, in quarto ; and 

 the works of Alpinus, De Plantis vEgypti, in 1640, in quar- 

 to, and De Plantis Exoticis, at Venice, 16S7, in quarto, 

 contain excellent plates and descriptions of a number of 

 very rare plants. 



443. 



It has already been mentioned, that Lobelius made the 

 first attempt to establish a definite arrangement of plants. 

 But Andrew Cesalpinus, professor at Risa, who died in 1603, 

 gave a wrong direction to the search after fixed scientific prin- 

 ciples; for, in his work De Plantis, published at Florence, 

 1583, in quarto, he first constructed a system, the foundations 

 of which were the fruit and its parts, especially the embryon, 

 and its situation in the seed. 



