Page:Makers of British botany.djvu/183

Rh title-page as Director of Kew. But the preface is dated May 1, 1838, from Glasgow, and it was printed at the University Press. The title-page further states that the plates were from the drawings of F. Bauer, but Sir Joseph Hooker points out (l.c. p. cviii), that "of the whole 135 genera depicted I think that 78 are by Fitch." Sir William in the preface states that "The plates have all been executed in my own residence, and under my own eye, in zincography, by a young artist, Walter Fitch, with a delicacy and accuracy which I trust will not discredit the figures from which they were copied." The result is one of the most sumptuous volumes in illustration of a single family ever published. After 70 years it is still the natural companion of all Pteridologists. At its close is a synopsis of the genera of ferns, according to Presl's arrangement, which Sir William describes as "the most full and complete that has yet been published." But in the preface he remarks that Presl "has laid too much stress on the number and other circumstances connected with the bundles of vessels in the stipes, which in the Herbarium are difficult of investigation." This is a specially illuminating passage for us at a time when anatomical characters are becoming ever more important as phyletic indices. It shows that readiness of diagnosis was for him a more important factor than details of structural similarity.

In the preface to the Genera Filicum Sir William says, he "would not have it to be understood that the Genera here introduced are what I definitely recommend as, in every instance, worthy of being retained....A more accurate examination of the several species of each Genus, which are now under review in the preparation of a Species Filicum, will enable me hereafter to form a more correct judgement on this head than it is now in my power to do." The five volumes of the Species Filicum thus promised, appeared at intervals from 1846 to 1864. The work is briefly characterised by Sir Joseph as consisting of "descriptions of the known Ferns, particularly of such as exist in the Author's Herbarium, or are with sufficient accuracy described in the works to which he has had access, accompanied by numerous Figures. This which will probably prove to be