[479] Brunfels in 1530, and Fuchs in 1542, were the two first writers who observed the vegetable kingdom for themselves, instead of copying what the ancients had said. Compare Whewell's Hist. of the Sciences, vol. iii. pp. 305, 306, with Pulteney's Hist. of Botany, vol. i. p. 38.
[480] The microscope was exhibited in London, by Drebbel, about 1620; and this appears to be the earliest unquestionable notice of its use, though some writers assert that it was invented at the beginning of the seventeenth century, or even in 1590. Compare the different statements, in Pouillet, Elémens de Physique, vol. ii. p. 357; Humboldt's Cosmos, vol. ii. pp. 699, 700; Sprengel, Hist. de la Médecine, vol. iv. p. 337; Winckler, Gesch. der Botanik, p. 136; Quekett's Treatise on the Microscope, 1848, p. 2; Cuvier, Hist. des Sciences, part ii. p. 470; Hallam's Lit. of Europe, vol. iii. p. 202; Leslie's Nat. Philos. p. 52. On the subsequent improvement of the microscope during the seventeenth century, see Brewster's Life of Newton, vol. i. pp. 29, 242, 243.
[481] See Balfour's Botany, p. 15. In Pulteney's Progress of Botany in England, this beautiful discovery is, if I rightly remember, not even alluded to; but it appears, from a letter written in 1672, that it was then becoming generally known, and had been confirmed by Grew and Malpighi. Ray's Correspond. edit. 1848, p. 98. Compare Richard, Eléments de Botanique, p. 46; where, however, M. Richard erroneously supposes that Grew did not know of the tracheæ till 1682.
[482] Compare Cuvier, Hist. des Sciences, part ii. p. 471, with Thomson's Vegetable Chemistry, p. 950.
[483] Dr. Thomson (Vegetable Chemistry, p. 950) says: ‘But the person to whom we are indebted for the first attempt to ascertain the structure of plants by dissection and microscopical observations, was Dr. Nathaniel Grew.’ The character of Grew's inquiries, as ‘viewing the internal, as well as external parts of plants,’ is also noticed in Ray's Correspond. p. 188; and M. Winckler (Gesch. der Botanik, p. 382) ascribes to him and Malpighi the ‘neuen Aufschwung’ taken by vegetable physiology late in the seventeenth century. See also, on Grew, Lindley's Botany, vol. i. p. 93; and Third Report of Brit. Assoc. p. 27.
[484] The first book of his Anatomy of Plants was laid before the Royal Society in 1670, and printed in 1671. Hallam's Lit. of Europe, vol. iii. p. 580; and Thomson's Hist. of the Royal Society, p. 44.
[485] ‘The presence of sexual organs in plants was first shown in 1676, by Sir Thomas Millington; and it was afterwards confirmed by Grew, Malpighi, and Ray.’ Balfour's Botany, p. 236. See also Pulteney's Progress of Botany, vol. i. pp. 336, 337; and Lindley's Botany, vol. ii. p. 217: and, as to Ray, who was rather slow in admitting the discovery, see Lankester's Mem. of Ray, p. 100. Before this, the sexual system of vegetables had been empirically known to several of the ancients, but never raised to a scientific truth. Compare Richard, Eléments de Botanique, pp. 353, 427, 428, with Matter, Hist. de l'Ecole d'Alexandrie, vol. ii. p. 9.
[486] In July 1665 he writes from Paris to his father, ‘The lecture of plants here is only the naming of them, their degrees in heat and cold, and sometimes their use in physick; scarce a word more than may be seen in every herball.’ Browne's Works, vol. i. p. 108.
[487] Cuvier mentioning the inferiority of Tournefort's views to those of his predecessors, gives as an instance, ‘puisqu'il a rejeté les sexes des plantes.’ Hist. des Sciences, part ii. p. 496. Hence he held that the farina was ex-crementitious. Pulteney's Progress of Botany, vol. i. p. 340.
[488] This is admitted even by his eulogist Duvau. Biog. Univ. vol. xlvi. p. 363.