50 ANNALS NEW YORK ACADEMY OF SCIENCES 



In the words of another, "In this great distress, Pastor Linnaeus called 

 upon a friend Dr. Rothman, a physician of Wexio who also taught physiol- 

 ogy and botany in the school. His verdict, however, was, 'Well, a preacher 

 Carl certainly never will be, but he might become a famous physician; and 

 that profession will feed a man as well as the church. Your son is far 

 advanced in natural history, and, vathout gainsaying, the foremost scholar 

 in botany. If you v\'ill permit, I will take him into my house : he shall eat 

 at my table gratis, and I will myself read with him during the year that 

 remains before he can proceed to a university.' It need not be told how 

 gladly father and son accepted this generous and well-timed offer." 



Carl now removed to Dr. Rothman; and this learned gentleman with 

 great discernment made it clear to his pi-otege of what great advantage, and 

 how indispensable, v.ere Latin and Greek for the study of medicine, botany 

 and natural history. 



The dead languages now became endowed with a living new interest, 

 and instead of Justinius and Cicero, he studied with enthusiasm Pliny's 

 " Natural History," performing thus a double study at the same time. 



Dr. Rothman grew daily more and more attached to his pupil, who 

 made amazing progress, and whose transcendent genius became more and 

 more evident. He found great delight in guiding the young naturalist in 

 his studies, but soon found, with little surprise and no envy, that his pupil 

 far outstripped himself, for Linnseus could acquire no more from him. 



Linnseus must enter the university, and nothing remained but to get the 

 certificate from the Wexio school. It was framed in very quaint and signifi- 

 cant words; and it is curious that the trope of a tree, carried all through, 

 should have been applied to the future of the professor of botany. It read 

 as follows: "The youths in schools may be likened unto young saplings in a 

 plantation, where it sometimes happens, although seldom, that young trees, 

 despite the great care bestowed on them, will not improve by being en- 

 grafted, but continue like wild untrained stems, and when they are finally 

 removed ar.d transplanted, they change their wild nature, and become 

 beautiful trees that bear excellent fruit. In which this respect, and no other, 

 this youth is now promoted to the University, where, perhaps, he may come 

 to a clime that will favor his further development." With this recommen- 

 dation Carl Linnseus went to Lund, the southern university of Sweden, in 

 1727. 



Here Linnseus boarded and lodged at the house of one Strobaeus, who 

 lectured in the university on natural history', geology, and botany. He was 

 a man of acknowledged great learning in these sciences, and possessed a 

 large private collection of stones, shell, biids and dried herbs. At this house 

 also lived a German student of medicine, Koulas, eight years the senior of 



