• THE PXORA OF NORTH AMERICA. 17 



with the Liniiivan and Banksian herbaria there. During- his stay 

 he was offered another position, viz., to fto to India as physician 

 of the East India Company; but he declined, having decided to 

 serve his own native country. His collections were very ricli. and 

 his Flora ludhe Occidentali.s, the ultimate result of his travels 

 and labor, is the foundation of our knowledge of theflora of the 

 West Indies. It contains the descriptions of 892 species of plants. 

 Of these 723 were new to science. 



After his return to Sweden, Swartz continued his botanical 

 explorations in different parts of Sweden. In 1802 he was called 

 to become the successor of Prof. Lepechin as director of the Royal 

 Academjr of Sciences at St. Petersburg-, but again he declined. He 

 was appointed director of the Eoyal Academy at Stockholm in 

 1807, made a knight of the Order of Vasa in 1908, and professor 

 of the Royal Carolinian Medico-Chirurgic Institute at Stockholm 

 in 1814. He died the 19th.of September, 1818. 



Swart.'i's knowledge of American plants, however, was not 

 limited to his own collections. While in England, he studied the 

 collections found in the herbaria of Sloane, Plukenet, Petiver, and 

 Banks. He corresponded freely with such men as Schreber, Willde- 

 now, Schrneder, Persoon, Mohr, Hooker, and Fischer, the promi- 

 nent botanists of his time. He received from Rev. Muhlenberg in 

 Pennsylvania a fine collection of American plants collected in 

 1710 and 1711. From these he described six new species of 

 mosses. 



In 1817 Rev. Forstrom, then residing on the island St. Bar- 

 tholomew, sent him a large collection of Antillian plants. These 

 furnished the material for his "Flora Bartholomensis et Guada- 

 loupensis", containing 31 new species. 



He was an acknowledged authority on ferns, mosses, and 

 lichens. He was the father of fern-knowledge; his Synopsis Filicmn 

 made a revolution in that science. He was one of the first to 

 adopt and apply the system of genera and species of mosses by 

 Hedwig, the father of bryology, and he knew almost as much about 

 lichens as his friend Acharius. In his books on these three classes 

 of plants are found numerous descriptions of North American 

 plants. 



The following publications from Schwartz's pen refer \\holly 

 or partly to North American plants: 



