184 
and the author of the first botanical work containing the recorded 
localities of our native plants. Sibthorp, almost equaily eminent 
as a botanist, lived and died in Bath. In astronomy, we have 
Herschell with his wonderful telescope, constructed in his resi- 
dence at New King Street, where he discovered the Georgium 
Sidus ; while living in Bath he contributed papers to the Royal 
Society as well as to the Bath Philosophical Association, of which 
he wasa_member, To these may be added the name of W. L. 
Bowles, who has been styled the father of modern English poetry, 
and W. Smith, the father of English geology ; Miss Lee, author 
of the first historical novel, and Pitman, inventor of the best 
system of Shorthand, now almost universally adopted in England 
and America. 
The extensive ground covered by local authors renders it diffi- 
cult to compress within the limited time any satisfactory notice 
of their works, I have therefore selected only a few of the most 
valuable and curious, limiting the period to the 16th and 17th 
centuries, and leaving later publications for a future occasion. 
These are now before you; many of them scarce and original 
editions ; one or two of them recently printed for the first time, 
centuries after the death of the writers ; a few others are modern 
reprints. 
Gildas Badonicus, Peter of Blois, Turner, Dean of Wells, 
circa 512-570. circa 1140-1200. 1520-1568. 
Sir John Harington, Samuel Daniel, John Hales, 
1561-1612. 1562-1619. 1584-1656. 
Prynne, Francis Roberts, H. Jeans, R. Alleine, 
1600-1609. 1609-1675. 1611-1662. 1611-1681. 
J. Alleine, Bishop Ken, Glanvill, Bishop Kidder, 
1634-1668. 1637-1710. 1636-1680. 1663-1708. 
John Norris, Matthew Hole, Arthur Bedford, 
1657-1711. 1637-17306. 1668-1745. 
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