VOL. XVri.] PHILOSOPHICAL TRANSACTIONS. 445 



winter, when the grass and corn is off the grounds, than in the spring itself. 

 And the officers designed for that purpose may buy all their timber under the 

 conditions of its being felled in winter, after the bark has been taken off in the 

 spring in due time. 



j1 Description of the Pimenta or Jamaica Pepper-Tree, and of the Tree that 

 bears the Cortex Pf'lnteranus. By Hans Shane,* M, D. and Reg. Sac. S. 

 N° 192, p. 462. 



The myrtus arborea foliis laurinis aromatica,-f- pimenta, Jamaica-Pepper, or 



• Sir Hans Sloane, baronet, so celebrated in the annals of Natural History, was a native of 

 Ireland, and was born at KilUleagh, in the north of that country, in the year 166O. He displayed a 

 very early propensity to the study of physic; but his pursuits were interrupted by a spitting of blood 

 with which he was affected in his ]6tb year, and which confined him to a state of domestic seclusion 

 for more than two years. After this he devoted himself to his professional studies, and having at- 

 tended in London the usual anatomical and chemical lectures, and pursued the study of botany in the 

 Chelsea garden, then but just established, he went to Montpelier in France, where he formed an ac- 

 quaintance with the celebrated Tournefort, and collected the plants of the south of France, &c. In 

 the year l6"80 he returned to London, where he was patronized by Sydenham, in whose house he 

 resided for some time. He became a member of the College of Physicians, and was elecied a Fellow 

 of the Royal Society. He was soon afterwards induced, through a desire of improving his knowledge 

 in Natural History, to attend the Duke of Albemarle to Jamaica in character of his physician, where 

 during a residence of little more than a year, he collected a vast variety of rare and curious plants, 

 &c. On his return he resumed tlie practice of physic, became eminent in his profession, and was 

 chosen physician to Christ's Hospital ; devoting, as it is said, the sum he received from this appoint- 

 ment, to the relief of the poorest patients in the Hospital, being unwilling to enrich himself by the 

 gains of a charitable institution. In 1693 he was elected Secretary to the Royal Society, and revived 

 the publication of the Philosophical Transactions, which had been suspended for some time. His 

 Museum, which he began early to collect, became, by incessant attention, superior to any thing of 

 the kind at that time in England, and at length received a great accession by the valuable collection 

 of shells belonging to Mr. Courlen, at whose death they became by purchase the property of Sloane. 

 Having now arrived at a considerable age, he was created a Baronet by (Jeorge the First, was chosen 

 a member of the Royal Academy of Paris, president of the College of Physicians of London, and 

 on the death of Sir Isaac Newton, president of the Royal Society. At length, the infirmities of 

 age increasing, he retired, at the age of 80, to Chelsea, where he continued the remainder of his 

 life, dying on the Uih of January 1752, in the 91st year of his age. In his person, he is said to 

 have been tall and well made ; in his manners polite and engaging. He bequeathed to the Company 

 ef Apothecaries, the entire freehold of the Botanical Garden at Chelsea; his Museum to the 

 public, on condition that the sum of 20,0001. should be paid to his family, a sum which is said by 

 some of his biographers to have been scarcely more than the intrinsic value of the gold and silver 

 medals in his collection. It is also to be observed that his library, consisting of more than 5000 

 volumes, was included. In the exercise of his profession, Sir Hans Sloane is said to have been re- 

 markable for the certainty of his prognostics, and the hand of the anatomist frequently verified the" 

 predictions of the physician. 



f Myitus Pimenta. Linn. 



VOL. III. 'i I 



