340 THROUGH THE FIELDS WITH LINNAEUS 



men delighted to dig up orchis roots in Bagley Wood, 

 and botanise by the wild stream that flows down be- 

 tween Billington and Cowley Marsh. 



Linnaeus in travelling abroad saw the best, as 

 ordinary tourists abroad see the worst, specimens of 

 humanity ' innkeepers, beggars, touts, and zany Cock- 

 neys.' As Dr. Arnold says, in travelling one ' gets an 

 unfavourable impression of the inhabitants in spite of 

 one's judgment.' 



What with his explorations, and visits to Professors 

 Martyn and Eand, and Dr. Shaw, and Mrs. Blackburne, 

 another lady botanist, besides an intimate and lasting 

 friendship he contracted with Dr. Isaac Lawson and 

 Mr. Peter Collinson of Mill Hill, near Hendon, one of 

 those cultivated Quakers who are such fervent gar- 

 deners a man of various studies, a friend after his 

 own heart, Linnseus's time passed very agreeably in 

 England, and these friends added many treasures to 

 the store he had procured at Chelsea of the rarest and 

 nondescript plants he was collecting for Clifford. 



Linnaeus, at Dillenius's request, remained some time 

 at Oxford exploring the country, riding, or oftener 

 walking, round by what is now the Firs, Haddington, 

 and by Livermore, where George Eliot describes c J. H. 

 Newman's little conventual dwelling, and from whence 

 one gains in returning a fine view of the Oxford towers.' 

 He crossed the original ford whence Oxford took its 

 name, and he saw New College, with its gardens, sur- 

 rounded by the old city wall, the chapel where William 



