1913-1914.] Io7 



descriptions of the plants. Reference was then made by the 

 President to Linne's visit to England in 1736, the cool reception 

 accorded him by Sir Hans Sloan, and the impression he made on 

 Dillenius, who was then professor at Oxford. In 1741 he was 

 appointed professor of botany in the University of Upsala, the 

 very post he desired of all others in the world. His merits were 

 by that time recognised in every country of Europe, and for 

 thirty-seven years his life was devoted to the science he loved. 

 He inaugurated the duties of his professorship of botany by 

 delivering before the University a Latin oration on "The benefits 

 of travelling in one's own country," one of the most lively of his 

 many addresses. Linne made large collections of plants, which 

 after his death were neglected by his own countrymen. Sir James 

 Edward Smith, who was intimate with him during the last years 

 of his life, purchased the collection from Linne's representatives 

 and despatched them to England. The Swedish Government 

 thereupon thought they were losing something of great value, and 

 despatched a ship to catch them, but failed. That was in the 

 year 1784. In 1788 Sir James Edward Smith founded the 

 Linnean Society, to become a fellow of which is regarded as the 

 greatest honour that a naturalist can obtain in the British Isles. 

 After Smith's death the Linnean collections were purchased by 

 subscription and given to the Linnean Society of London, by 

 whom they are now preserved in Burlington House. Previous to 

 the publication in the third edition of Linne's "Genera Plantarum" 

 and in the first two editions of that work there was no such 

 method of nomenclature employed as that by the names of genus 

 and species. Each plant bad one name with a long tail of three, 

 four, or more descriptive words attached to it. Thus the white 

 water-lily, which was Nymphcea calcye tetraphylla corolla mulliplice, 

 became under Linne's dual nomenclature simply Ny??iphcea alba. 

 His aim was to classify plants according to their natural parts, 

 and he made a beginning by using the organs of fructification for 

 this object. In trying to estimate the services of Linne to science 



