594 
remain the slave of the transcendental, whether in the 
shape of an imaginary Being, of the Absolute, or 
Transcendental Morality, they cannot reap the fruits 
of reason. If the minority became the majority, 
society and all its institutions and codes would be 
radically altered. 
Take but one example, and a current one—birth- 
control. When Mr. Wells’s “ Father Amerton” finds 
that it is the basis of Utopian civilisation he exclaims | 
in horror: “‘ Refusing to create souls! The wickedness 
of it! Oh, my God!” 
This is the great enemy of true progress—this belief 
that things have been already settled for us, and the 
consequent result of considering proposals not on their 
merits, but in reference to a system of principles which is 
for the most part a survival from primitive civilisations. 
Mr. Wells may often be disagreed with in detail: he 
is at least right in his premises. A perusal of his 
novel in conjunction with a commentary would be 
useful. ‘‘Men Like Gods” taken en sandviche with, 
say, Punnett’s “‘Mendelism,”’ Trotter’s “Instincts of 
the Herd,” Thouless’s ‘Psychology of Religion,” 
Carr-Saunders’s “‘ Population Problem,’’ Whetham on 
eugenics, and a good compendium of recent psycho- 
logy, would be a very wholesome employment of the 
scientific imagination. esr tt 


Linnean Correspondence. 
Bref och Skrifvelser af och till Carl von Linné med 
understod af Svenska Staten utgifna af Uppsala 
Universitet. Forsta Afdelningen, Del 8: Bref till och 
fran Svenska enskilda personer Kalm- Laxman. 
Utgifna och med upplysande noter férsedda af J. M. 
Hulth. Pp.v+200. 6kroner. Andra Afdelningen, 
Utlandska brefvaxlingen ; Del 1: Adanson-Briin- 
nich. Utgifven och med upplysande noter forsedd 
af J. M. Hulth. Pp. vii+430. 12kroner. (Uppsala: 
A.-B. Akademiska Bokhandeln, 1916 and 1922.) 
INCE the death of Carl von Linné, better known in 
this country under his Latinised name of Linnzus, 
nearly a score of works have been issued containing 
selections of his letters, many of them restricted to his 
relations with a single person, as Jacquin, B. de Jussieu, 
or Sauvages. But these only dipped into the extensive 
correspondence which is available, and the Swedish 
Government has aided the University, of which 
Linnzus was so distinguished a professor, to bring out 
a complete issue of all the letters known to be in exist- 
ence, as part of the publications commemorating the 
bicentenary of the birth of the great naturalist in 1907. 
The editor was, naturally, Emeritus Professor T. M. 
Fries, who, four years earlier, had produced his monu- 
NO. 2792, VOL. 111] 
WATURE 

[May 5, 1923 
mental life of Linné and was steeped in Linnean lore and 
knowledge of his contemporaries. Six volumes had 
been brought out under his editorship when his death, 
early in 1913, closed his industrious career, and left the 
series of volumes less than half‘ finished. These six 
belonged to the first section, devoted to letters to and 
from Swedes ; a seventh was partly prepared, and the 
first volume of the second section, devoted to foreigners, 
was in course of preparation when the editor’s life 
closed. The successor to Fries was Dr. J. M. Hulth, 
chief librarian of the University of Uppsala, but the 
time available for the subject so essential was obtained 
with difficulty by a very busy man. Nevertheless, we 
have here two volumes for a brief survey—volume 8 of 
the first section, extending from Kalm to Laxman, 
and a first volume of the second section, embracing the 
letters from Adanson to Briinnich. 
Naturally, the latter volume attracts the non- 
Swedish reader, nearly the whole being in Latin, and the 
forty-nine writers include Francis Calvert, sixth and 
last Lord Baltimore (the owner of Maryland), Sir Joseph 
Banks, John Bartram, the early North American 
botanist of Philadelphia, Johann Bartsch, the close 
friend of Linnzus, who fell a victim to the climate of 
Surinam, Anna Blackburne, Herman Boerhaave, the 
celebrated Dutch physician, whose pathetic farewell to 
Linnzeus is one of the most touching episodes in the 
Swede’s career, and Patrick Browne, whose volume on 
Jamaica plants incited Linnzus to buy his herbarium 
for himself. Much might be extracted from these 
letters, but their comparative accessibility prompts our 
passing on to the other volume before us. 
The forty-one letters from Pehr Kalm to his former 
teacher extend over 118 pages, more than half the 
volume, and are especially interesting. Kalm had 
travelled in Russia, whence the first letters were sent, 
but having undertaken a journey to North America, he, 
with an assistant, reached London in February 1748, 
and hastened the same day to report his arrival. His 
letters, written in Swedish, are couched in a fresh and 
lively Style, and convey his first impressions. He 
hesitated to call upon the persons to whom he had been 
recommended till he should have acquired a better 
command of English, for though many wrote and spoke 
Latin, it was differently pronounced, and thus difficult 
to understand. In this he succeeded, as he was obliged 
to stay six months in London, waiting for a ship to 
America. He remarked on the milder winter of 
England compared with that of Sweden, and of the 
many plants which could stand out of doors unharmed. 
Soon we find him telling about his acquaintances. 
Philip Miller of Chelsea Physic Garden, and a special 
friend Richard Warner of Woodford (1711-1775), 
whose splendid garden yielded many seeds for Uppsala, 
=—_, 
