The VEGETABLE SYSTEM. 63 
These are the few defeds ; the refl: appears to me unexcep- 
tionable. 
His generical charaders are excellent. To his fpecific ones (that 
are often his own, though fometimes taken from Linnaeus) he ccn- 
ftantly adds a defcription of the habit, virtues, &c. of the Plant. 
And laftly, let me affirm to his honour, that he is the firfl; who, in 
his Ordo Generum, has put Marks to diftinguiffi thofe Genera in-- 
ferted in his Claffes that do not anfwer the Claffical charader j nor 
has he omitted adding them to thofe Clalfes under which they ought, 
according to the Rules of his Syflem, to have been ranked. 
Wachf.ndorfius publiffied a fyftem in 1747, of the Utrecht 
Plants, taken much from Royen ; but with ffich long Greek names, 
and fo aftoniffiing a Synoplis, that few people have ever looked into 
it. He has many of Royen’s natural Claffies, but reverfes his fyfleni 
in fome meafure : he calls the Cup and Petals a double Periantheum: 
he has fome orders taken from the proportion or number of the Sum- 
mits to the Filaments : he begins with the Umbelliferae, and follows 
Linn^us’s names: when that Author fails him, he takes up with 
Bauhin’s, not prefuming to invent one. The very titles of hi* 
Claffies are too tedious to copy; the reader muffi therefore have recourfe 
to the work itfelf. 
lx theMEMoiRES DEBERLixfor i7j'G Gleditsch has given tiie 
outlines of another method. The great divifions are taken from the 
iituation of the Chives : thefe are four 
Thalamostemones, where they are fixed on one ffiage.. 
Petalostemoxes, on the Petal. 
Calycostemones, on the Cup. 
Stylostemoxes, on the Pointal. 
Each of thefe is divided into Chives united, or feparate. This 
method feems entirely artificial ; the ffiiperior orders are only given, 
and thefe generally are , Apetalae, Petalodeas, iEquales, Inequales. 
Till it is more finiffied, it is not capable of further examination. 
There is another attempt to form a method in a very fingular 
manner by Guettard : it is by a microfcopical examination of the 
Hairs, Fibres, &c. of the Leaves. He began in 1747, and has 
not, I believe, finiffied his fcheme. What he at prefent attempts is 
putting all thofe Plants together in an order that he finds agree in 
cer- 
