66 LETTER FROM THE REV. JOHN WHITE. 



town while Mr. Lever is there, he will bring them. I shall go 

 to see him as he returns. 



What leisure time I have I employ in collecting insects, 

 which I have promised Mr. Barrington as a beginning of his 

 ' Fauna Britannica.' I wish Jacky would pick up all the variety 

 that he can, put them into spirits, and there let them remain 

 till I can get them. Pray examine your sands for the Myr- 

 meleon. If in England I know no likelier place. Why 

 should not England have it as well as Sweden ? * * * I now 

 recollect that I promised some remarks on your Swift in my 

 next. I have a few observations to make on that bird, but 

 no criticism on your dissertation ; and therefore I thought 

 you would be better pleased to see Linnseus's letter. 



I am drawing towards the conclusion of my insects ; and 

 shall then proceed to the quadrupeds, birds, and fishes. After 

 all there must be a general correction and transcript of the 

 whole, which will be no small undertaking. 



We have had a sad, gloomy, wet, chilly season. We are 

 now sitting over a fire. I have brush'd up my house as spruce 

 as if it were for sale ; but it is to give you as agreeable an idea 

 of Lancashire as I can. * * * 



Mrs. White is well, and joins in best wishes and respects 

 with, dear brother, 



Your most oblig'd and affect. 



J. W. 



[It was proposed at one time that a new edition of the 'Systema 

 Naturaa ' should be published in this country by Benjamin White. The 

 discussion of this project will be found in the correspondence between 

 John White and Linnaeus, in the letters numbered from IV. to IX. inclu- 

 sive. It was approved by John White, but positively declined by Ben- 

 jamin upon commercial grounds. For similar reasons he refused to 

 undertake a new edition of Linnaeus's { Mantissa Plantarum.' As this 

 proposition was made in the year 1776 (the former edition, termed 

 4 Mantissa altera,' having been published in 1771), it could scarcely have 

 been done with the author's knowledge, as he was in that year suffering 

 from a second attack of apoplexy, which had impaired his mental powers, 

 rendering him a very distressing object. This melancholy circumstance 

 is alluded to by Gilbert White in his letter to his brother John of the 

 date of October 31, 1777, as the cause of Linnaeus's not writing to him. 

 T. B.] 



