LINNAEUS AND NATURAL HISTORY 115 
(Historia Animalium, 1549-1553), and Aldrovandi, the 
Italian (Opera, 1599-1606). The former consisted of four 
folio volumes, and the latter of thirteen, of ponderous size, 
to which was added a fourteenth on plants. Jonston’s works 
were translated, and were better known in England than those 
of Gesner and Aldrovandi. The wood-engravings in Aldro- 
vandi’s volume are coarser than those of Gesner, and are by 
no means so lifelike. In the Institute at Bologna are pre- 
served twenty volumes of figures of animals in color, which 
were the originals from which the engravings were made. 
These are said to be much superior to the reproductions. 
The encyclopedic nature of the writings of Gesner, Aldro- 
vandi, and Jonston has given rise to the convenient and 
expressive title of the encyclopeedists. 
Ray.— John Ray, the forerunner of Linnzeus, built upon 
the foundations of Gesner and others, and raised the natural- 
history edifice a tier higher. He greatly reduced the bulk 
of publications on natural history, sifting from Gesner and 
Aldrovandi their irrelevancies, and thereby giving a more 
modern tone to scientific writings. He was the son of a 
blacksmith, and was born in southern England in 1628. 
The original form of the family name was Wray. He was 
graduated at the University of Cambridge, and became a 
fellow of Trinity College. Here he formed a friendship with 
Francis Willughby, a young man of wealth whose tastes for 
natural history were like his own. This association proved 
a happy one for both parties. Ray had taken orders in the 
Church of England, and held his university position as a 
cleric; but, from conscientious scruples, he resigned his 
fellowship in 1662. Thereafter he received financial assist- 
ance from Willughby, and the two men traveled extensively 
in Great Britain and on the Continent, with the view of inves- 
ligating the natural history of the places that they visited. 
On these excursions Willughby gave particular attention to 
