208 Linnean Society. [May 24, 



ferred to as connected with his attachment to science ; it occurred 

 suddenly in the rooms of the Literary and Philosophical Society of 

 Manchester, of which he was one of the Vice-Presidents. While 

 engaged in an animated conversation on the progress of the Ordnance 

 Survey, his breathing was observed to become difficult, and the mo- 

 ment after he was found to be dead. 



Among our Foreign Members we have to commemorate 

 Don Jose Pavon, a botanist of considerable merit, and the colleague 

 of Ruiz in the memorable botanical expedition dispatched to Peru 

 by the Spanish Government in the year 1777, from which were ob- 

 tained such important results both in collections and publications. 

 On the recommendation of Ortega, then Professor of Botany at 

 Madrid, the expedition was placed under the direction of Ruiz, who 

 was accompanied by Pavon and by two artists, Brunete and Galvez. 

 M. Dombey also, who had been dispatched from France on a similar 

 mission, was allowed to accompany them ; and during a residence of 

 ten years they visited many of the most interesting districts of Peru 

 and Chile. In 1788 Ruiz and Pavon returned to Europe, bringing 

 with them large collections of plants and an extensive series of bo- 

 tanical drawings, and leaving behind them two of their pupils, Tafalla 

 (afterwards Professor of Botany in the University of Lima), and 

 Pulgar (an artist of merit), to continue their investigations. The 

 collections thus made by themselves, and those which were subse- 

 quently transmitted to them, formed the basis of a series of works on 

 the botany of the Western Regions of South America, which, had 

 they been carried on to completion, would have been indeed a mag- 

 nificent contribution to science, and which even in their present in- 

 complete state are of high importance. The first of these publica- 

 tions appeared in 1794, under the title of ' Florae Peruvianse et Chi- 

 lensis Prodromus,' and contains descriptive characters and illustrative 

 figures of their new genera. This was followed in 1798 by the first 

 volume of the ' Flora Peruviana et Chilensis,' two other volumes of 

 which, extending as far as the class Oc^a««?n« of the Linnean system, 

 were published in 1799 and 1802. The plates of a fourth volume, 

 as well as many others intended for subsequent publication, were also 

 prepared. In 1798 also was published the first volume of a smaller 

 work without figures, entitled ' Systema Vegetabilium Florae Peru- 

 vianae et Chilensis,' containing characters of all their new genera 

 and of the species belonging to them, as well as of all the other spe- 

 cies described in the first volume of their ' Flora.' 



Of the immense collections made by Ruiz and Pavon and other 



