MEMOIR OF DR. LINDLEY. 
437 
plants upon the natural system more perfect, and especially at a time when some 
of the most celebrated botanical writers were exhibiting a tendency to revert to 
a more artificial distribution of the smaller divisions of a natural arrangement 
than the state of botanical knowledge required. In 1833 Dr. Lindley published 
his Nixus Plantar um^ in which the natural orders were distributed into alliances 
and groups ( nixus et cohortes ) under the primary divisions of the vegetable 
kingdom. This work was merely an outline containing short distinctive charac¬ 
ters in Latin. It was, however, calculated to be useful; and, being well received 
by botanists, was quickly out of print, when the author was induced to publish 
a second edition in English, with many alterations and improvements, under the 
title of Key to Systematic Botany. With this work he also republished the 
contents of a small volume he had formerly printed, called Outlines of the First 
Principles of Botany; the two, forming one volume, constitute a valuable 
epitome of botanical science. 
In 1831, an important event in the history of British science took place in the 
formation of the migrating British Association. At the meeting at Cambridge, 
in 1832, Dr. Lindley was requested to draw up a report on the present state of 
the science of Botany. This report was read the following year at the Oxford 
meeting, and was an able epitome of the then state of our knowledge upon the 
subject. Although Botany was introduced to the Association under such able 
auspices, perhaps no branch of science has received from it so little benefit. 
The labours of Dr. Lindley, up to the publication of his Nixus , had been chiefly 
confined to the production of works adapted for the advanced student; but, duly 
appreciating the importance of easy and popular introductions to science, he 
engaged in the production of a series of familiar letters on the study of Botany 
by the natural system, published under the title of Ladies Botany. In this 
volume he has successfully refuted the objection occasionally urged against the 
natural system, as unfitted for those who are commencing the study of Botany. 
Ladies’ Botany was published in 1834, and a second edition has been lately 
printed. 
In 1836, when a new edition of the Introduction to the Natural System was 
required, Dr. Lindley took the opportunity of rendering this work much more 
complete. He arranged the whole of the orders under the alliances and 
groups, which he had before published in his Key ; and instead of giving merely 
a few examples of the genera under each order, he furnished complete lists of 
the genera and their synonyms, so that the work assumed a much more com¬ 
prehensive and complete character. The whole appeared under the title of A 
Natural System of Botany. 
One of the most recent works produced by Dr. Lindley, and which appeared 
last year, is the Flora Medica. Although perhaps no man could be found so 
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