22 NATURAL HISTORY. 



cluster are those of the friends and fellow-workers, John 

 Ray and Francis Willughby. 



John Ray has been called the ' Aristotle of England,' 

 but he was in reality rather the English Linnaeus, his 

 merits as an observer and systematiser being greater than 

 his abilities as a philosopher. Moreover, he was more of 

 a botanist than a zoologist; his purely zoological work 

 being so far blended with that of Willughby, that it is 

 a thankless task to attempt to indicate precisely the share 

 of merit which posterity ought to allot to each of these 

 great men. 



John Ray was born on the 291)1 of November 1628, at 

 the little village of Black Notley, near Braintree, in Essex. 

 He was* of humble birth, his father, Roger Ray, being a 

 blacksmith ; and he certainly owed comparatively little to 

 his early education, as he was bred a scholar at Brain- 

 tree School, and has left it on record that he regarded 

 this as a great misfortune. Little is known of his boyish 

 years ; but it may be gathered that he was deeply attached 

 to his parents, and especially to his 'most dear and 

 honoured mother.' When he was sixteen years of age he 

 was sent to Cambridge, where he entered at St Catharine's 

 Hall.* In about a year and three-quarters, however, he 

 removed to Trinity College, where he had the advantage 

 of being taught by the well-known Dr Duport, a celebrated 

 scholar of his day.t ' Under this learned tutor,' to use Dr 



* Ray's name appears in the college books as ' Wray,' he having for a time 

 chosen to write himself in this fashion. 



t James Duport was Master of Magdalene College, Dean of Peterborough, and 

 Professor of Greek at Cambridge. He died in 1679. The present writer possesses 

 one of his works entitled ' Threnothriambos,' consisting of the book of Job translated 

 into Greek verse, with a Latin version ; together with Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, and 

 Solomon's Song in Greek hexameters. This copy is interesting as bearing upon its 



