A VISIT TO ENGLAND 321 



Notwithstanding his stylish appearance Sir Hans Sloane 

 received him none too warmly. He had been king of 

 natural history too long to care about welcoming a 

 possible successor, especially one who would try to upset 

 all his arrangements. Fascinating men l are apt to dis- 

 turb the world.' 



Sir Hans was getting too old to enter into new 

 theories, and Linnasus's bold attempts (for he had heard 

 of him otherwise than through Boerhaave) to introduce 

 a new system of nomenclature excited in him more 

 jealousy than admiration. 1 



Cake and wine of course were offered such was 

 then the fashion for morning visits ; but Latin, as it is 

 spoken, is hard to be understood between speakers using 

 a different pronunciation. It is easy enough to those 

 already used to Italian; but although the Latin lan- 

 guage is much easier for scientific intercommunication 

 than French or German, talk is still uneasy to Eng- 

 lish Latinists. There is nothing more absurd than the 

 modern crusade against Latin or Greek by people who 

 deem science the only useful education. Considering that 

 with every science we have to learn its terminology, it is 

 absurd to think we can do better than learn those 

 languages, which are the alphabet of all science. Who 

 can even read a book on anatomy unless he has studied 

 Greek and Latin ? The same with chemistry or mine- 

 ralogy : every third word is in an unknown tongue. 

 Any foreigner who knows Latin can read an English 



1 Stoever. 

 VOL. I. Y 



