IV ANECDOTES OF LINN^US. 



which he had but too little opportunity at Upsal. 

 That science almost entirely engrossed his speech, 

 and every thought of his mind ; and being the only 

 naturalist then at that university, such a privation 

 must have occasioned to him a great deal of irk- 

 someness. 



" When I got acquainted with Sir Charles Lin- 

 naeus, who was then in his fifty-sixth year, increasing 

 age had already furrowed his front with wrinkles. 

 His countenance was open, almost constantly serene, 

 and bore great resemblance to his portrait in the 

 Species Plantarum. But his eyes, of all the eyes 

 I ever saw, were the most beautiful. They cer- 

 tainly were but little, but darted a refulgent splen- 

 dour and a penetration of aspect which I never 

 observed before in any other man. It sometimes 

 appeared to me, as if his looks would penetrate 

 through the very innermost recesses of the heart. 



" His mind was remarkably noble and elevated, 

 though I well know that some persons accused him 

 of several faults ; the acuteness and energy of his 

 mental faculties, even shone through his eyes. But 

 his greatest excellence consisted in the systematical 

 order by which his thoughts succeeded each other. 

 Whatever he said or did was faithful to order, to 

 truth, and to regularity. In his youth his memory 

 was uncommonly vigorous, but it began to sink 

 early into decay. Even when I was with him, he 

 could not sometimes remember the names of his 

 dearest friends and relatives. I still recollect to 

 have seen him once very much embarrassed, when, 



