]4S NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS. 



I hope that this specimen of the effusions of two of the most celebrated wits of 

 the age may not be considered as improper. 



Dryden was also one of the earliest members of the Royal Society, and was 

 finally excused from paying his arrears probably on account of his straightened 

 circumstances. See Birch. 



The Royal Society certainly afforded some ground for the ridicule that was 

 cast upon them. Sprat says, " their manner of gathering and dispersing ques- 

 tions is this : First they require some of their particular fellows to examine all 

 treatises and descriptions of the natural and artificial productions of those coun- 

 tries in which they would be informed. At the same time they employ others 

 to discourse with the seamen, travellers, tradesmen, and merchants, who are 

 likely to give them the best light. Out of this united intelligence from men and 

 books they compose a body of questions concerning the observable things of those 

 places." These questions, so framed, were dispersed to their correspondent? 

 in different quarters. Thus far the scheme was judicious, and was in general 

 judiciously executed ; but some of the questions were calculated to create mirth 

 at the expense of the society. Sprat has published answers returned by a gentle- 

 man ofBatavia to certain inquiries sent thither. Two .of them are as follows : 



" Whether in the island of Sambrero, which lyeth northwards of Sumatra, 

 about eight degrees northern latitude, there be found such a vegetable as master 

 James Lancaster relates to have seen, which grows up to a tree, shrinks down 

 when one offers to pluck it up into the ground, and would quite shrink unless 

 held very hard ? and whether the same being forcibly plucked up, hath a worm 

 for its root, diminishing more and more according as the tree groweth in great- 

 ness ; and as soon as the worm ia wholly turned into the tree, rooting in the 

 ground, and so growing great ? and whether the same plucked up young, turns, 

 by that time it is dry, into a hard stone, much like to white coral ? 



'" Answer. I cannot meet with any that ever have heard of such a vegetable. 



" What ground there may be for that relation concerning horns taking root 

 md growing about Goa ? 



" Answer. Inquiring about this, a friend laught, and told me it was a jeer 

 put upon the Portuguese, because the women of Goa are counted much given to 

 lechery." 



END OF NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS. 



