Dr. Suirn’s Introductory Difcourfe. 27 
interefting object of enquiry with feveral able men, among the 
firft of whom were Goedart and Swammerdam. The difcoveries 
of Goedart were received with laudable caution by his contempora- 
ries, efpecially what relates to the hiftory. of Ichneumones; but 
following obfervers have confirmed the accuracy of his relations. 
The works, of Swammerdam are full of curious information, and 
will fufficiently reward thofe whofe patience is not to be exhaufted 
by his tedious heavy ftyle. Nor muft I forget Madam Merian, 
whofe excellent work on the Surinam Infeéts, one of the moft 
fplendid in natural hiftory, is a monument of female perfeverance 
and enthufiafm. 
Other admirers of nature have turned their attention to fhells 
and marine productions; and the facility with which thefe bodies 
are preferved in cabinets, has made the collecting them very 
general. A few authors had written on fhells about the beginning 
of the laft century, as Aldrovandus, Columna, Imperati, &c. but 
about the end of the century two very eminent writers were par- 
ticularly diftinguifhed in Conchology, Bonanni and Lifter. Their 
works are in daily ufe. In the different publications of the latter 
are many curious anatomical obfervations, and Bonanni has treated 
the formation of fhells in a very philofophical manner. Some in- 
terefting hints on the fame fubjeét are to be found in Steno’s “ De 
Solido intra Solidum Differtationis Prodromus,” printed at Florence 
~ in 1669. 
Of all the parts of Natural Hiftory, Mineralogy for a long time 
made the floweft progrefs. From the time of Theophraftus to the 
.end of the feventeenth century few improvements were made in 
the knowledge of Foffils. What little was written in all that 
time contained only repetitions of old erroneous fuperftitious 
opinions. — Even at the period of which I am fpeaking, a 
ftriking idea of the darknefs of this fcience may be formed, from 
E2 Tourne- 
