52 THE VICTORIAN NATURALIST. 



in a Carthusian convent, but afterwards tui-ned Protestant, and 

 devoted himself to the study of medicine instead of theology, 

 living at first in Slrassburg, where his book was printed, afiei- 

 wards as town physician in Berne, Switzerland, where he died in 

 1534. The American genus Brunfelsia was named in his 

 honour by Plumier, a French botanical traveller of the time of 

 Louis XIV. 



I will pass over Hieronynuis Bock, or Tragus, as he calls him- 

 self in his Latin writings, as I have none of his works to submit 

 for your inspection ; he seems to have been to some extent a 

 pupil of Brunfels ; his several works appeared from 1539 lo 

 1552. Nor will I dilate on Ruellius, a learned French physician 

 and botanist of about the same period. 



The next man of note in botanical science was Dr. Leonhartus 

 Fuchsius, as he called himself in his Latin writings. He was 

 undoubtedly a man of great learning, a Court physician, and was 

 knighted by the Emperor Charles V., but his biographers also 

 describe him as a man of great vanity and self-estimation, as is 

 exemplified on the title page of his best-known work — " De His- 

 toria Stirpiuu)," published in 1542, in Basel, Switzerland, of 

 which I can submit two copies, one in folio, with the figures 

 coloured by some former possessor ; the other a later edition, in 

 duodecimo, seemingly with the original vellum binding. There 

 are 512 illustrations of plants in this work. He had a larger 

 volume ready with 1,500 figures, but death overtook him before 

 he could find the means of publishing such an expensive work, 

 and it was never printed. He is said to have obtained the degree 

 of Bachelor of Arts when he was thirteen years of age, and was 

 M.A. when only twenty. He sometimes practised as a physician, 

 at other times as a university professor of medicine in Ingolstadt, 

 and afterwards Tuebingen, where he died in 1566. The genus 

 Fuchsia is named in his honour. To Fuschius wc owe the first 

 attempt at botanical nomenclature, although in this respect he 

 is much excelled in clearness by the next on our list- — Dodoens 

 or Rembertus Dodonaeus ; the well-known genus Dodonaea is 

 named after him. Dodonaeus was born in Malines, Belgium, 

 and received a university education, obtaining the degree of 

 Licentiate of Medicine in his eighteenth year. Botany, as usual 

 in those times, was closely associated with medicine, and Dodo- 

 naeus devoted himself with predilection to the former. As one of 

 the results of his labours, I can submit his " Stirpium Historiae 

 Pemptades " of 1583, but his first work was written in 1552, 

 when he described about 1,500 species of plants, many of his 

 plates being borrowed from Fuchsius. Phillip H. of Spain 

 wished to have him as a physician, but the negotiations did not 

 come to anything; however, in 1574, Dodonaeus accepted an 

 appointment as physician to the Emperor Maximilian IL, in 



