Among the German Fathers of Botany, Sprengel includes a comparatively little known name, that of Valerius Cordus (1515-1544), a man whose actual achievement was small, but who, if he had not died so young, would probably have become one of the most famous of the earlier herbalists. His father, Euricius Cordus, was a physician, botanist, and man of letters, so Valerius was brought up in a fortunate environment. At sixteen he graduated at the University of Marburg, and, after studying in various towns, he passed from the position of pupil to that of teacher, and expounded Dioscorides at the University of Wittenberg. He travelled widely in search of plants, and visited many of the savants of the period. He is known to have made a stay at Tübingen, and it is highly probable that he became personally acquainted with Leonhard Fuchs.

Cordus had always longed to see, under their native skies, the plants about which the ancients had written, and, in fulfilment of this dream, he undertook a long excursion into Italy. He visited many of the towns, amongst others Padua, Bologna, Florence and Siena, travelling partly on foot and partly on horseback, and generally accompanied by his friend Hieronymus Schreiber. The journey was a very trying one to men accustomed to a more northerly climate. Wild and difficult country had to be traversed in the height of summer, and the exposure and fatigue led to a tragic conclusion. Cordus was injured by a kick from a horse, which brought on a fever, and his companions had great difficulty in getting him as far as Rome. He rallied, however, and his friends were deceived into the belief that he was on the road to recovery. They even thought it safe to leave him, while they made an excursion to Naples, but he did not survive until their return. His fate, like that of Keats, was to see Rome and die.

None of the botanical works of Valerius Cordus were published during his life-time, but his commentaries on Dioscorides and his ‘Historia stirpium’ were edited by Gesner after his death. The great merit of the ‘Historia’ lies in the vividness of the descriptions. The author seems to have examined the plants for their own sake—not merely in the interest of the arts of healing.

Cordus did noteworthy service to medicine, however, for when he passed through Nuremberg on his travels he was able to lay before the physicians of that town a collection of medical recipes, chiefly selected from earlier writings. This work, which had for some time been in use in Saxony in manuscript form, was considered so valuable that, after it had been examined and tested under the auspices of the town council, it was published officially as the Nuremberg ‘Dispensatorium,’ probably in 15469. This is said to be the first work of the nature of a pharmacopœia ever published under government authority.

Like the majority of the herbalists, Theodor was a medical man, and his study of botany was a hobby which extended over many years. He projected a herbal, but was unable for a long time to carry the idea into effect, being deterred by the cost of the illustrations. This difficulty was eventually overcome, chiefly through the generosity of Count Palatine Frederick III, and of the Frankfort publisher, Nicolaus Bassæus. The herbal first appeared in 1588, under the title ‘Neuw Kreuterbuch,’ and in 1590 the illustrations were published without any text as the ‘Eicones plantarum.’ The herbal is a large and very finely illustrated work. The figures, however, are for the most part not original, but are reproduced from Bock, Fuchs, Dodoens, Mattioli, de l’Écluse and de l’Obel. This collection of wood-blocks became familiar in England a few years later, when they were acquired by the printer John Norton, and used to illustrate Gerard’s ‘Herball’ which appeared in 1597.

There is still another German herbalist of the sixteenth century whose work must not be overlooked. This is Joachim Camerarius10 the younger (Plate VI). His father was a celebrated philologist, and a friend of Melanchthon. The son, who was born in 1534, was attracted to botany in his early youth. He studied at Wittenberg and other universities, and travelled in Hungary and Italy. He spent some time in the latter country, and took a doctor’s degree in medicine at Bologna. At Pisa, he became acquainted with Andrea Cesalpino. Finally he returned to Germany, and settled down at Nuremberg. Here he cultivated a garden which was kept supplied with rare plants by his friends, and the Nuremberg merchants.

Camerarius brought out an edition of Mattioli (‘De plantis Epitome’), but his chief work was the ‘Hortus medicus et philosophicus,’ which appeared in 1588. The illustrations to this book consist partly of drawings by Gesner, which the author had bought a few years previously, and partly of original figures. It is impossible to discriminate with any exactness between the work of the two men. These wood-cuts, of which Text-figs. 34, 35, 71 and 100 are examples, will be discussed more fully in Chapter VII. From the botanical point of view, they represent a considerable advance, since the details of floral structure are often shown on an enlarged scale. Camerarius was a good observer, and his travels furnished him with much information regarding the localities for the plants which he described.

2. The Herbal in the Low Countries.

In the sixteenth century, the Herbal flourished exceedingly in the Low Countries. This was due in part to the zeal and activity of the botanists of the Netherlands, but perhaps even more to the munificence, and love of learning for its own sake, which distinguished that prince of publishers, Christophe Plantin of Antwerp. In these qualities he forms a notable contrast to Egenolph of Frankfort, to whose shortcomings we have already drawn attention.

Plantin’s life extended from about 1514 to 1589, and thus included the central years of that wonderful century. He was a native of Touraine, and studied the art of printing at Caen and other French towns. Towards 1550, he and his wife, Jeanne Rivière, settled in Antwerp, where he worked at book-binding, and his wife sold linen in a little shop. Later, he returned to the profession of printing, and his business in this direction gradually developed, and was eventually transferred to the famous Maison Plantin. Christophe’s reputation grew to such an extent that great efforts were made, in various quarters, to tempt him from Antwerp. The Duke of Savoy and Piedmont, for instance, did all he could to persuade him to come to Turin, promising him extensive printing works and all necessary funds—but he remained faithful to the city of his adoption. Perhaps the most potent factor in his success was his keen judgment of men, which enabled him so to choose his subordinates that he gathered around him an unrivalled staff.

One of Plantin’s daughters married Jean Moretus, her father’s chief assistant and successor, and from him the business descended through eight generations of printers to Édouard Jean Hyacinthe Moretus, the last of his race, from whom, in 1876, the citizens of Antwerp purchased the Maison Plantin and its contents. The house had remained practically unchanged since the days when Christophe Plantin lived and worked there, and it is now preserved as the Musée Plantin-Moretus. It is built round a rectangular courtyard, and its beauty, both in proportion and in detail, is such, that one feels at once that Plantin achieved the ambition he expressed in his charming sonnet—‘Le Bonheur de ce Monde’—“Avoir une maison commode, propre et belle.”

The pictures, furniture and hangings, and not only the very presses, fonts, and furnaces for casting the type, but even the old account books and corrected proof-sheets are still to be seen, all in their appropriate places. The wage-books are preserved, showing the weekly earnings of compositors, engravers and book-binders, throughout a period of three centuries. In short, the Maison Plantin beggars description, and a visit there is an infallible recipe for transporting the imagination back to the time of the Renaissance, when printing was in its first youth, and was treated with the reverence due to one of the fine arts.

The first Belgian botanist of world-wide renown was Rembert Dodoens [or Dodonæus] (Text-fig. 36). He was a contemporary of Plantin, having been born at Malines in 151711. He studied at Louvain, and visited the universities and medical schools of France, Italy and Germany, eventually qualifying as a doctor. He was successful in his profession, being physician to the Emperors Maximilian II and Rudolph II, and finally becoming Professor of Medicine at Leyden, where he died in 1585. His interest in the medical aspect of botany led him to write a herbal, and, in order to illustrate it, he obtained the use of the wood-blocks which had been employed in the octavo edition of Fuchs’ work. To these a number of new engravings were added. The book was published in Dutch in the year 1554 by Vanderloe, under the title ‘Crǔÿdeboeck.’ The text is not a translation of Fuchs, as is sometimes supposed, although Dodoens took Fuchs as his model for the order of description of each plant. The method of arrangement is his own, and he indicates localities and times of flowering in the Low Countries, information which clearly could not have been derived from the earlier writer. Almost simultaneously with the first Dutch edition, a French issue appeared under the title of ‘Histoire des Plantes.’ The translation was carried out by Charles de l’Écluse, with whose own work we shall shortly deal. Dodoens supervised the production of the book, and took the opportunity to make some additions. It became known in England through Lyte’s translation, which will be discussed in a later section of this chapter.

The last Dutch edition of the herbal, for which the author himself was responsible, was printed by Vanderloe in 1563. The publisher then parted with Fuchs’ blocks, which were probably acquired by the printer of Lyte’s Dodoens in England. This circumstance put great difficulties in the way of Dodoens’ wish to reproduce his herbal in Latin. However it proved a blessing in disguise, for he had the good fortune to meet, in Christophe Plantin, “un homme qui ne reculait devant aucune dépense, pour donner aux ouvrages qui sortaient de ses presses toute la perfection et le mérite dont ils étaient susceptibles.” Plantin undertook to produce a much modified Latin translation of the herbal, and to have new blocks engraved for it, whilst Dodoens, on his side, engaged to supply the artists with fresh plants, and to superintend their labours. The work proceeded slowly, and was published in parts. It was finally completed in 1583, and was produced in one volume, under the name of ‘Stirpium historiæ pemptades sex sive libri triginta.’ In this work, by far the larger number of the figures are original (see Text-figs. 37, 38, 96 and 97); some, however, were borrowed from de l’Écluse and de l’Obel. This arose from the fact that Plantin was also the publisher for both these writers, and as he bore the expense of their blocks, he had an agreement with the three authors that their illustrations should be treated as common property. A few of Dodoens’ figures were based upon those in the famous manuscript of Dioscorides, now at Vienna (see pp. 8, 85, 154).

In the ‘Pemptades,’ the botanist in Dodoens was more to the fore, and the physician less in evidence than in his earlier work. It is particularly difficult to appraise with any exactness the services which Dodoens rendered to botany. Between him and his two younger countrymen, de l’Écluse and de l’Obel, there was so intimate a friendship that they freely imparted their observations to one another, and permitted the use of them, and also of their figures, in one another’s books. To attempt to ascertain exactly what degree of merit should be attributed to each of the three, would be a task equally difficult and thankless.

Charles de l’Écluse [or Clusius12] (Plate VII) was born at Arras in the French Netherlands in 1526; like Dodoens, he passed the closing years of his life at Leyden. He studied at Louvain, and other universities, including Montpelier, where he came under the influence of the botanist, Guillaume Rondelet, who also numbered d’Aléchamps, de l’Obel, Pierre Pena and Jean Bauhin among his pupils. De l’Écluse was an enthusiastic adherent of the reformed faith, to which he was converted by the influence of Melanchthon, and he suffered religious persecution, which brought even actual martyrdom to some of his relatives. Though he did not himself lose his life, he was deprived of his property, and, between poverty and ill-health, his career seems to have been a melancholy one. He passed a nomad existence, attached at one time as tutor to some great family, while, at others, he was occupied in writing or translating for Rondelet, Dodoens or Plantin, or undertaking precarious employment at the court of Vienna. The University of Leyden finally appointed him to a professorship. It is interesting to note that he paid more than one visit to England, and that he was intimate with Sir Francis Drake, who gave him plants from the New World.

De l’Écluse had a reputation for versatility scarcely exceeded by that of his contemporary, the “Admirable” Crichton. He is said to have had a wide knowledge of Latin, Greek, French, German, Flemish, Spanish, law, philosophy, history, geography, zoology, mineralogy and numismatics, besides his chosen subject of botany. Since his botanical début was made as the translator of Dodoens, we may with reason look upon him as a disciple of the latter.

The first original work de l’Écluse produced was an account of the plants which he had observed while on an adventurous expedition to Spain and Portugal with two pupils. This was so successful botanically that he brought back two hundred new species. The description of his finds was published by Plantin in 1576, under the title of ‘Rariorum aliquot stirpium per Hispanias observatarum Historia.’ Wood-blocks were engraved purposely for this book (see Text-figs. 39, 59 and 98), but, for the confusion of the bibliographer, some of them were also used to illustrate Dodoens’ work in the interval while the Spanish flora of de l’Écluse awaited publication. In 1583 appeared our author’s second work, which did the same service for the botany of Austria and Hungary as the previous volume had done for the botany of Spain. These two works, together with some additional matter, were republished in 1601 as the ‘Rariorum plantarum historia.’ In this book, the species belonging to the same genus are often brought together, but, beyond this, there is little attempt at systematic arrangement.

De l’Écluse was weak in the synthetic faculty, his strength lying rather in his powers of observation. Cuvier reckons that he added more than six hundred to the number of known plants. It is characteristic of his versatile mind, that his botanical interests were not confined, like those of most of the early workers, to flowering plants. A manuscript is preserved in the Leyden Library13 containing more than eighty beautiful water-colour drawings of fungi, executed under the direction of de l’Écluse, by artists employed by his great friend and patron, Baron Boldizsár de Batthyány. This gentleman is said to have been so enthusiastic a botanist, that he set a Turkish prisoner at liberty, on the condition that he should obtain plants for him from Turkey.

De l’Écluse seems to have been a man of wide friendships, and his botanical correspondence was very large. He did much for horticulture, and is called by his friend, Marie de Brimen, Princesse de Chimay, “le père de tous les beaux Jardins de ce pays.” He deserves especial gratitude for one benefit of a very practical nature, namely the introduction of the Potato into Germany and Austria. It is worthy of note that de l’Écluse, unlike the majority of the herbalists, was not a physician, and although he laid considerable stress on the properties of plants, he was not preoccupied with the medical side of the subject. He studied plants for their own sake, and abandoned the futile effort to identify them with those mentioned by the ancients.

The third of the trio of botanists whom we are now considering is Mathias de l’Obel [de Lobel or Lobelius], who was born in Flanders in 1538, and died in England, at Highgate, in 1616 (Plate VIII). He studied at Montpelier, under Guillaume Rondelet, who, finally, bequeathed to him his botanical manuscripts. Here also he became acquainted with a young Provençal, Pierre Pena, with whom he afterwards collaborated in botanical work. De l’Obel took up medicine as his profession, and eventually became physician to William the Silent, a post which he held until the assassination of the Stadtholder. Later on, he and Pena came to England, probably to seek a peaceful life under the prosperous sway of Queen Elizabeth, which was so favourable to the arts and sciences. Their principal work was dedicated to her, in terms of hyperbolic praise. De l’Obel seems to have been well received in this country, for he was invited to superintend the medicinal garden at Hackney, belonging to Lord Zouche, and he eventually obtained the title of Botanist to James I.

De l’Obel’s chief botanical work was the ‘Stirpium adversaria nova14,’ published in 1570, with Pena as joint author. Pena does not appear to have been a botanist of much importance, and he eventually quite forsook the subject in favour of medicine. It has been suggested, however, that de l’Obel was inclined to minimise the value of his colleague’s work. The system of classification, upon which de l’Obel’s reputation really rests, is set forth in this book. The main feature of his scheme is that he distinguishes different groups by the peculiarities of their leaves. He is thus led to make a rough separation between the classes which we now call Dicotyledons and Monocotyledons. The details of his system will be considered in a later chapter.

In 1576 the work was enlarged, and republished as the ‘Plantarum seu Stirpium Historia’; it was also translated into Flemish, and appeared under the title of ‘Kruydtbœck’ in 1581, dedicated to William of Orange, and the Burgomasters and other functionaries of Antwerp. The blocks (see Text-fig. 67) used to illustrate this work were taken from previous books, especially those of de l’Écluse. Immediately after the publication of the Kruydtbœck, Plantin brought out an album of the engravings it had contained, which, although they had been also used to illustrate the herbals of Dodoens and de l’Écluse, were now grouped according to de l’Obel’s arrangement, which was recognised as the best.

3. The Herbal in Italy.

The Italian botanists of the Renaissance devoted themselves chiefly to interpreting the works of the classical writers on Natural History, and to the identification of the plants to which they referred. This came about quite naturally, from the fact that the Mediterranean flora, which they saw around them, was actually that with which the writers in question had been, in their day, familiar. The botanists of southern Europe were not compelled, as were those whose homes lay north of the Alps, to distort facts before they could make the plants of their native country fit into the procrustean bed of classical descriptions.

One of the chief of the commentators and herbalists of this period was Pierandrea Mattioli [or Matthiolus] (Text-fig. 40), who was born at Siena in 1501, and died of the plague in 1577. We realise something of the frightful extent of this scourge, when we remember that it claimed as victims no less than three of the small company of Renaissance botanists, Gesner, Mattioli and Zaluzian. Leonhard Fuchs was brought into fame by his successful treatment of one of these epidemics. It should also be recalled that, while Gaspard Bauhin, one of the best known of the later herbalists, was practising as a physician at Basle, no less than three of these terrible outbreaks occurred in the town.

Mattioli was the son of a doctor, and his early life was passed in Venice, where his father was in practice. He was destined for the law, but his inherited tastes led him away from jurisprudence to medicine. He practised in several different towns, and became physician, successively, to the Archduke Ferdinand, and to the Emperor Maximilian II.

Mattioli’s ‘Commentarii in sex libros Pedacii Dioscoridis,’ his chef-d’œuvre, the gradual production and improvement of which occupied his leisure hours throughout his life, was first published in 1544. It was translated into many languages and appeared in countless editions. The success of the work was phenomenal, and it is said that 32,000 copies of the earlier editions were sold. The title does not do the book justice, for it contains, besides an exposition of Dioscorides, a Natural History dealing with all the plants known to Mattioli. The early editions had small illustrations only (Text-figs. 41, 42, 93 and 94), but, later on, editions with large and very beautiful figures were published, such as that which appeared at Venice in 1565 (Text-figs. 43, 44, 95).

Mattioli’s descriptions of the plants with which he deals are not so good as those of some of his contemporaries. He found and recorded a certain number of new plants, especially from the Tyrol, but most of the species, which he described for the first time, were not his own discoveries, but were communicated to him by others. Luca Ghini, for instance, had projected a similar work, but handed over all his material to Mattioli, who also placed on record the discoveries made by the physician, Wilhelm Quakelbeen, who had accompanied the celebrated diplomatist, Auger-Gislain Busbecq, on a mission to Turkey.

Busbecq brought from Constantinople a wonderful collection of Greek manuscripts, including Juliana Anicia’s copy of the Materia Medica of Dioscorides, now in the Vienna Library (see pp. 8 and 154). He discovered this great manuscript in the hands of a Jew, who required a hundred ducats for it. This price was almost prohibitive, but Busbecq was an enthusiast, and he successfully urged the Emperor, whose representative he was, “to redeem so illustrious an author from that servitude15.” His purpose in buying the manuscript seems to have been largely in order to communicate it to Mattioli, who would thus be able to make use of it in preparing his Commentaries on Dioscorides.

The personal character of Mattioli does not appear to have been a pleasant one. He engaged in numerous controversies with his fellow botanists, and hurled the most abusive language at those who ventured to criticise him.

Another Italian herbalist, Castor Durante, slightly later in date than Mattioli, should perhaps be mentioned here, not because of the intrinsic value of his work, but because of its widespread popularity. At least two of his books appeared in many editions and translations.

Durante was a physician who issued a series of botanical compilations, bedizened with Latin verse. The best known of his works is the ‘Herbario Nuovo,’ published at Rome in 1585 (Text-figs. 45 and 103). A second book, the original version of which is seldom met with, has survived in the form of a German translation, by Peter Uffenbach. The German version was named ‘Hortulus Sanitatis.’ As an illustration of Durante’s charmingly unscientific manner, we may take the legend of the “Arbor tristis” which occurs in both these works. The figure which accompanies it (Text-fig. 45) shows, beneath the moon and stars, a drawing of a tree whose trunk has a human form. The description, as it occurs in the ‘Hortulus Sanitatis,’ may be translated as follows:

“Of this tree the Indians say, there was once a very beautiful maiden, daughter of a mighty lord called Parisataccho. This maiden loved the Sun, but the Sun forsook her because he loved another. So, being scorned by the Sun, she slew herself, and when her body had been burned, according to the custom of that land, this tree sprang from her ashes. And this is the reason why the flowers of this tree shrink so intensely from the Sun, and never open in his presence. And thus it is a special delight to see this tree in the night time, adorned on all sides with its lovely flowers, since they give forth a delicious perfume, the like of which is not to be met with in any other plant, but no sooner does one touch the plant with one’s hand than its sweet scent vanishes away. And however beautiful the tree has appeared, and however sweetly it has bloomed at night, directly the Sun rises in the morning it not only fades but all its branches look as though they were withered and dead.”

Much more famous than Durante was Fabio Colonna, or, as he is more generally called, Fabius Columna (Plate IX), who was born at Naples in 1567. His father was a well-known littérateur. Fabio Colonna’s profession was that of law, but he was also well acquainted with languages, music, mathematics and optics. He tells us in the preface to his principal work that his interest in plants was aroused by his difficulty in obtaining a remedy for epilepsy, a disease from which he suffered. Having tried all sorts of prescriptions without result, he examined the literature on the subject, and discovered that most of the writers of his time merely served up the results obtained by the ancients, often in a very incorrect form. So he went to the fountain head, Dioscorides, and after much research identified Valerian as being the herb which that writer had recommended against epilepsy, and succeeded in curing himself by its use.

This experience convinced Colonna that the knowledge of the identity of the plants described by the ancients was in a most unsatisfactory condition, and he set himself to produce a work which should remedy this state of things. This book was published in 1592, under the name of ‘Phytobasanos,’ which embodies a quaint conceit after the fashion of the time. The title is a compound Greek word meaning “plant torture,” and was apparently employed by Colonna to explain that he had subjected the plants to ordeal by torture, in order to wrest from them the secret of their identity. But it must be confessed that Colonna himself is by no means free from error, as regards the names which he assigns to them.

The great feature of the ‘Phytobasanos,’ however, is the excellence of the descriptions and figures. The latter are famous as being the first etchings on copper used to illustrate a botanical work (Text-figs. 46 and 105). They were an advance on all previous plant drawings, except the work of Gesner and Camerarius, in giving, in many cases, detailed analyses of the flowers and fruit as well as habit drawings. We owe to Colonna also the technical use of the word “petal,” which he suggested as a descriptive term for the coloured floral leaves16.

By means of his wide scientific correspondence, Colonna kept in touch with many of the naturalists of his time, notably with de l’Écluse and Gaspard Bauhin.

A passing reference may be made here to a book which is rather of the nature of a local flora than a herbal, entitled ‘Prosperi Alpini de plantis Ægypti,’ which was published at Venice in 1592. It contains a number of wood-cuts, which appear to be original. The one reproduced (Text-fig. 47) represents Salicornia, the Glasswort. The author was a doctor who went to Egypt with the Venetian consul, Giorgio Emo, and had opportunities of collecting plants there. He is said to have been the first European writer to mention the Coffee plant, which he saw growing at Cairo. Prospero Alpino eventually became Professor of Botany at Padua, and enriched the botanical garden of that town with Egyptian plants.

4. The Herbal in Switzerland.

Among the many scientific men, whose names are associated with Switzerland, one of the most renowned is Konrad Gesner (Plate X), who was born at Zurich in 1516, the son of a poor furrier. His taste for botany was due, in the first instance, to the influence of his uncle, a protestant preacher. Konrad went to France to study medicine, but in Paris, the richness of the libraries, and the delight of associating with learned men, tempted him away from his special subject into a course of omnivorous reading. After an interval of school teaching at Zurich, he betook himself to Basle, where he entered more methodically upon the study of medicine, at the same time attempting to support himself by working at a Latin dictionary. However, after a short period of student life, he found the expense too great, and was obliged to abandon it, and to take a post as teacher of classics in Lausanne. He had received assistance at different times from his native town, which again came to his help at this juncture, and generously allotted to him a “Reisestipendium,” for the continuance of his medical studies. He indeed owed much to Zurich, for, after taking his doctorate, he was appointed first to the professorship of Philosophy there, and then to that of Natural History, which he held until he died of the plague in his forty-ninth year.

Gesner’s most remarkable characteristic was his versatility and encyclopædic knowledge; he has been called the Pliny of his time. His work on bibliographical and linguistic subjects was of importance, and he also wrote on medicine, mineralogy, zoology and botany. The botanical works published during his life were not of great importance, but, at the time of his death, he had already prepared a large part of the material for a general history of plants, which was intended as a companion work to his famous ‘Historia Animalium.’ In order to illustrate it, he had collected 1500 drawings of plants, the majority original, though some were founded on previous wood-cuts, especially those of Fuchs. The undertaking was so far advanced that some of the figures had been drawn upon the wood, and certain blocks had even been engraved. The whole collection, and the manuscripts, he bequeathed for publication to his friend Caspar Wolf. Wolf seems to have made an honest effort to carry out Gesner’s wishes, and he succeeded in publishing a few of the wood-cuts, as an appendix to Simler’s ‘Vita Conradi Gesneri’ (e.g. Text-fig. 48). Unfortunately he was hampered by weak health, and the task, as a whole, proved beyond his powers. He sold everything to Joachim Camerarius the younger, with the proviso that the purchaser should make himself responsible for the publication. Camerarius failed to fulfil the spirit of this obligation. It is true that he brought a large number of Gesner’s figures before the public, but he did this only by the indirect method of using them, among his own drawings, to illustrate an edition of Mattioli, and a book of his own.

Finally, about a hundred and fifty years after the death of Camerarius, Gesner’s drawings and blocks came into the possession of the eighteenth-century botanist and bibliographer, Christoph Jacob Trew, who published them, thus giving Gesner his due so far as was possible at that late date. Such blocks as were in good condition were printed directly, and, from the drawings, a number of copper engravings were made, coloured like the originals. The drawings were of unequal merit, some of them being on a very small scale and lacking in clearness. In one point, however, Gesner shows a marked advance on the methods of his contemporaries—namely in giving detailed, analysed studies of flower and fruit structure, as well as a drawing showing the habit of the plant. It must not be forgotten that, even in Trew’s edition, it is impossible to discriminate with certainty between the work of Gesner and that of Camerarius.

Unfortunately, we have no knowledge of the text of Gesner’s manuscript, but his letters make it clear that his interest in botany was thoroughly scientific. If his work were extant, he would probably shine as a discoverer of new species, especially among alpines, for his figures indicate that he was acquainted with a number of plants which de l’Écluse, Gaspard Bauhin and others were the first to describe.

Jean Bauhin’s chief botanical work, the ‘Histoire universelle des plantes,’ was a most ambitious undertaking, which he did not live to see published. However, his son-in-law Cherler, a physician of Basle, who had helped him in preparing it, brought out a preliminary sketch of it in 1619, and, in 1650 and 1651, the magnum opus itself was published, under the name of ‘Historia plantarum universalis.’ This book is a compilation from all sources, and includes descriptions of 5000 plants. The figures, of which there are more than 3500, are small and badly executed. A large proportion of them are ultimately derived from those of Fuchs.

Jean Bauhin’s more famous brother, Gaspard [or Caspar] (Plate XI), was born in 1560, and was thus the younger by nineteen years. Gaspard studied at Basle, Padua, Montpelier, Paris and Tübingen. He also travelled in Italy, making observations upon the flora, and becoming acquainted with scientific men. Unfortunately he missed being a pupil of Leonhard Fuchs, since his sojourn at Tübingen took place some years after the death of the famous herbalist, who had been his brother’s teacher. The illness and death of his father in 1582 made it necessary for him to settle in Basle, where he became Professor of Botany and Anatomy, and eventually of Medicine.

Inspired by the example of his brother, he conceived the plan of collecting, in a single work, all that had been previously written upon plants, and, especially, of drawing up a concordance of all the names given by different authors to the same species. His extensive early travels served as a good preparation for this task, since he had not only observed and collected widely, but had established relations with the best botanists in Europe. He formed a herbarium of about 4000 plants, including specimens from correspondents in many countries, even Egypt and the East Indies. Besides study bearing directly on his great project, he accomplished a considerable amount of critical and editorial work, which also had its value in relation to his main plan. He produced new editions of Mattioli’s Commentaries, and of the herbal of Tabernæmontanus, and published a criticism of d’Aléchamps’ ‘Historia plantarum.’

There is a marked parallelism between the careers of the Bauhin brothers, for Gaspard’s great work underwent much the same vicissitudes as that of Jean. The main part of Gaspard’s chief work never saw the light at all, although his son brought out one instalment of it, many years after his father’s death. Gaspard was however more fortunate than Jean, in that he lived to see the publication of three important preliminary volumes, as the result of his researches, and it is on these that his reputation rests.