INTRODUCTION CXXVll 



The Reverend William Stoxestreet was educated at Cambridge, Stohe- 

 where lie took his Master of Arts degree in 1681, and was Rector of street, "\\ 

 St. Stephen, Walbrook, in 1689. A very large number of his plants 

 are preserved in the Du Bois herbarium at Oxford, but few unfor- 

 tunately have any locality affixed to them. Among these few are 

 Equisetum sylvcdician from near Maidenhead in Buckinghamshire, 

 Myosotis collina from Surrey, a form of Convolvulus arvensis from near 

 Henley — from a spot therefore which might be either in Oxfordshire 

 or Berkshire, Lycopodium inundatum from Bagshot Heath, and Lolium 

 temulentum from near Windsor, but in Surrey. 



William Sherard, whose name was originally Sherwood, was born Sherard, 

 at Bushby in Leicestershire in Feb. 1658-9. He was educated at W. 

 Merchant Taylors' School, and in 1677 was elected into St. John's 

 College, Oxford, where he took the degree of B.C.L. in 1683. It was 

 then probably that he was elected Fellow of the College, as in the 

 same year he obtained leave of absence to travel beyond the seas. 

 He spent the years 1686, 1687, and 1688 in Pai'is, where he studied 

 Botany under Tournefort. The Scliola Botanica was published in 1689, 

 and was almost certainly the work of Sherard. He returned to Eng- 

 land in the same year, and obtained further leave of absence from his 

 College. During the next three years he was Tutor to Sir Arthur 

 Rawdon, and resided for that period in Ireland, where he made many in- 

 teresting botanical discoveries. He writes from Moyra in County Down 

 on June 6, 1691, to say that he ' was viewing a mountain about fifteen 

 miles distant, which did not prove according to expectation. On my 

 return home,' he proceeds, 'by a Lough side, in a very wet rotten 

 bog, I met with Helleborine flore albo \_Cephcdanthera ensifolia], which, 

 besides the difference of its growing from that on Stokenchurch hills 

 [Oxfordshire], where I have found it plentifully, the narrowness 

 and length of its leaves persuade me is a distinct kind.' Subularia 

 aquatica was discovered by him in Lough Neagh, and also a plumose 

 form of Athyrium Filix-foemina, Carex dioica, L., and Chara polyacantha, and 

 almost certainly Spergida pentandra. 



Sherard took the degree of Doctor of Civil Law on June 23, 1694, 

 and obtained permission to travel for five years. Accordingly he 

 made a continental tour, during which he appears to have acted as 

 Tutor to Viscount Townshend K In Feb. 1695 he was engaged in pre- 

 paring Hermann's papers for the press, and in 1697 the Paradisus 

 Baiavus was published for the benefit of the Leyden Professor. In 

 June of the same year Wriothesley, eldest son of Lord William 

 Russell, was created Baron Howland on the occasion of his marriage, 

 when fourteen years old, to a rich heiress, the only daughter of 

 John Howland, and after the ceremony the bridegroom travelled in 



1 See Pulteney's Sketches, vol. ii. p. 141. 



