446 CORRESPONDENCE OF RAY. 



Mr. RAY to Dr. HANS SLOANE. 



Black Notley, June 10, 1704. 



SIR, I received yours of June 8th, and return you 

 thanks for your good advice therein contained. In most 

 particulars I agree with you, as that this winter weather, 

 unseasonable at this time of the year, hath and doth 

 much exasperate the pain of my sores. Also I am [in] 

 accord with you in what you write concerning too much 

 purging in this or any course. But I have a body on 

 which no cathartics which I have hitherto used will work 

 orderly and seasonably, unless the dose be immoderate. 

 I have not been so careful in keeping up my legs and 

 not letting them hang down too much as you rationally 

 advise, and which I was sensible would be best for 

 me for the reasons you allege. Strait-stockings and 

 bandage I have used and do still, but carelessly and to no 

 great effect. The smalls of my legs I cannot bind 

 straight, because they are almost surrounded with 

 ulcers. 



Your advice about the antiscorbutic juices of scurvy- 

 grass, watercresses, and brooklime, I doubt whether it 

 would be agreeable to me, those juices being, I suspect, 

 too hot for me. Sir Thomas Millington cautioned me 

 against the use of scurvy-grass in my diet drink in sum- 

 mer time, upon that account. I find you have a better 

 opinion of my performances in natural history than they 

 deserve. I have ordered my bookseller to present you 

 with a copy of my Supplement of the larger paper, which 

 I entreat you to accept as a small acknowledgment of 

 your extraordinary kindness and the many obligations 

 you have laid upon me. 



As for your observations by way of introduction to 

 your ' Natural History of Jamaica,' I should be glad to 

 see them, for my own improvement, not that my appro- 



