Historical Account of Testaccoiogical Writers. 
127 
ALDROVANDUS 
followed the disposition of shells adopted by Gesner, except that 
he inverted the order of the classes, and altogether omitted, the 
objectionable one of Anomala. His work " de Moll/bus Critstaceis, 
Testaceis, et Zoophytis" is divided into four books. Hie figures 
are coarse and inaccurate, and less fit for reference than those 
of, perhaps, any other of the older writers on this science. 
COLUMNA. 
The treatise of Fabius Columna is to be considered rather as a 
Monographia of the Purpura than as referable to shells in general ; 
but it contains descriptions of a few rarer species, and of some 
fossils also, which are all neatly figured in seven copper plates, 
exclusive of the one attached to a dissertation on Glossopetrce. 
•This work was re-published in 1(575 by John Daniel Major, 
M. D. whom we shall notice hereafter. 
In the same year with Col umnas Treatise on the Purpura ap- 
peared the excellent plates of 
BASIL BESLER 
(apothecary of Nuremberg), well known among the naturalists 
of that period, particularly for his attachment to botany. These 
plates are highly finished, and perhaps altogether superior to any 
that had appeared before on copper relative to subjects of na- 
tural history. Two of them only contain figures of shells, the 
lovers of which must lament that there are no more, so elegantly 
and correctly are they executed. There are specific descriptions 
in Latin and German. The work has for its title " Fasciculus 
Jxariorum," &c. and, though inconsiderable in its extent, well 
deserves a place in the library of the curious naturalist. 
CHIOCCO. 
