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136
My Studio Neighbors
·
W. Hamilton Gibson
57
As
far
back
as
botanical
history
avails
us
these
forms
have
been
the
same,
each
true
to
its
particular
species
of
flower,
each
with
an
underlying
purpose
which
has
a
distinct
and
often
simple
reference
to
its
form;
and
yet,
incredible
as
it
now
seems
to
us,
the
botanist
of
the
past
has
been
content
with
the
simple
technical
description
of
the
feature,
without
the
slightest
conception
of
its
meaning,
dismissing
it,
perhaps,
with
passing
comment
upon
its
"eccentricity"
or
"curious
shape."
Indeed,
prior
to
Darwin's
time
it
might
be
said
that
the
flower
was
as
a
voice
in
the
wilderness.
In
1735,
it
is
true,
faint
premonitions
of
its
present
message
began
to
be
heard
through
their
first
though
faltering
interpreter,
Christian
Conrad
Sprengel,
a
German
botanist
and
school-master,
who
upon
one
occasion,
while
looking
into
the
chalice
of
the
wild
geranium,
received
an
inspiration
which
led
him
to
consecrate
his
life
thence-forth
to
the
solution
of
the
floral
hieroglyphics.
Sprengel,
it
may
be
said,
was
the
first
to
exalt
the
flower
from
the
mere
status
of
a
botanical
specimen.
This
philosophic
observer
was
far
in
advance
of
his
age,
and
to
his
long
and
arduous
researches--a
basis
built
upon
successively
by
Andrew
Knight,
Koehlreuter,
Herbert,
Darwin,
Lubbock,
Mueller,
and
others--we
owe
our
present
divination
of
the
flowers.
In
order
to
fully
appreciate
this
present
contrast,
it
is
well
to
briefly
trace
the
progress,
step
by
step,
from
the
consideration
of
the
mere
anatomical
and
physiological
specimen
of
the
earlier
botanists
to
the
conscious
blossom
of
to-day,
with
its
embodied
hopes,
aspirations,
and
welcome
companionships.
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