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ninety in this way ; which was fuppofed to arife from 

 feeding the ewes upon it about the end of the year, though 

 it had been made ufe of before without any bad effeft of 

 this kind. The ewes in this inftance had been hard kept. 

 The fame circumftance has alfo taken place among the 

 flocks of other fheep-farmers. The fame fort of crop has, 

 however, been fed on the other fide of the hedge at the 

 fame time with tlie fame fort of (lock without any incon- 

 venience of this nature occurring. It is, therefore, moft 

 probably to be afcribed to fome other unperceived caufe. 

 Ewes are, Iiowever, certainly, from fome caufe or other, 

 very fubjeft to (lip their lambs, and of courfe require much 

 care and .ittention in this refpeft. They fhould conitantly 

 be kept in a ftate of quiet, and free from all fort of dif- 

 turbance fir fome time after the ram has been put to them. 

 SLIRE, in Geography, a town of Norway, in the pro- 

 vince of Agtcerhuus ; 68 miles N.N.W. of Chriftiania. 



SLIT, in jigr'icuhure, a crack or cleft in the brealls of 

 fat cattle, &c. 



S].iT-Grafting. See Engraftixg. 

 Sur-P/anl'tng, among planters, a mode of planting trees 

 in fmall openings without the whole of the ground being 

 dug out, a fmall flit or opening only being made for each 

 tree. See Planting. 



SLITTE, in Geography, a river of Scotland, which runs 

 into the Tiviot, near Hawick, in Roxburghfhire. 



SLOANE, Sir Hans, in Biography, immortalized as 

 the principal founder of the Britifh Mufeum, was born at 

 Killaleagh, in the county of Down, Ireland, April i6, 

 1 660. His family is faid to have been of Scottifli extrac- 

 tion ; but whatever their fituation in life might be, they 

 were deflined to acquire more honour from him, than he 

 derived from them ; though, by the education which he 

 received, his circumftances appear to have been far from 

 indigent. He is faid to have been attached, from his youth, 

 to the ftudy of nature, and this led him perhaps to that of 

 medicine, as a profeflion. A fpitling of blood confined 

 him at home for three years, and it was not till his 19th 

 year that he was able to enter on a regular courfe of medical 

 education at London. To this he devoted the four fuc- 

 ceeding feafons, during which he was introduced to the 

 V acquaintance, and even the friendfliip, of Boyle and Ray ; 

 great names, whofe continued favour affords fufBcient tef- 

 timony of the fuccefsful application of the young ftudent, 

 to the two fciences in which they refpeftively took the lead. 

 Sloane proceeded to Paris, in company with Mr. Tancred 

 Robinfon ; fee Robinsonia. There he attended the lec- 

 tures of Toumefort and Du Verney ; and he is reported to 

 hare taken his medical degrees at Montpellier. This he 

 could hardly have done as a Proteftant, and therefore we 

 prefume another report to be more correft, of his having 

 graduated at Orange, where poflibly there might, at that 

 time, be a fort of Proteftant univerfity. Returning to 

 London late in 1684, Dr. Sloane became a favourite and, 

 inmate of the great Sydenham, who feems to have intended 

 taking him by the hand as a phyfician. He was foon 

 chofen a fellow of the Royal Society, and in April 1687, 

 entered into the College of Phyficians. Thefe early ad- 

 vancements afford, as Dr. Pulteney remarks, the ftrongeft 

 prefumptions in favour of his knowledge and abihties. 

 Yet he relinquifhed his domeltic profpefts, to gratify his 

 ardour for natural knowledge. 



A defire of invettigating the natural hiflory of the Welt 

 Indies, the appetite for which, among the learned of Europe, 

 had rather been whetted than fatisfied by flight and fuper- 

 ficial information, induced Dr. Sloane to embark for Jamaica, 

 in September 1687, as phyfician to the duke of Albemarle, 



juft then appointed governor of that ifland. But the death 

 of this nobleman, on the 19th of December, foon after their 

 arrival, putting an end to the office of his phyfician, the 

 ftay of the latter in the new world, which he had been fo 

 eager to vifit, became abridged by his circumftances, and 

 necefl'ary profpefts in life. He fnatched fifteen months 

 from thefe calls, and devoted that period, with all pofTible 

 ardour, to the accompliftiment of the real objeft of his 

 voyage. The Weft Indies had hitherto been vifited by 

 Englilhmen, for none but the moft fordid purpofes, and 

 the paffions, taftes, and charafters of the fettlers have 

 generally been formed and moulded by tlie mahgnant in- 

 fluence of their domeftic fyftem, their luxurious habits, 

 and the natural eifefts of the chmate. Sloane paffed through 

 this triple ordeal untouched ; for he was armed by a love 

 of nature, a thirft for knowledge, and lufficient fcientific 

 acquirements to be fenfible of the value of what he podeffed, 

 and of what lay within his reach. He made ample col- 

 leiStions of natural hiltory, bringing home from Jamaica, 

 Barbadoes, Nevis, and St. Kitt's, about 800 fpecies of 

 dried plants, enriched with a moft abundant itore of in- 

 formation refpefting their quahties and ufes. He arrived 

 in London, May 29, 1689, where he direftly refumed his 

 medical occupations, with which he happily and fuccefs- 

 fuUy affociated his literary purfuits. A fine perfon, and 

 agreeable manners, doubtlefs contributed more to his fuccefs 

 as a London phyfician, than the fkill of Hippocrates would 

 have done by its own intrinfic worth. The intereft of 

 Dr. Sloane feems to have lain much in the city. In 1694 

 he became phyfician to Chriil's hofpital, and the next year 

 he married Ehzabeth, daughter of alderman Langley, who 

 lived with him near thirty years, dying in 1724. She 

 bore him- a fon and daughter^ who died young ; befides 

 two daughters, who carried rich inheritances into the 

 families of Stanley and Cadogan, and who both furvived 

 their father. — In 1693 Dr. Sloane was defied fecretary to 

 the Royal Society, which ofHce he held for nineteen years, 

 to the great honour and benefit of that body as well as 

 himfelf, for he immediately revived the publication of its 

 Philofophical Tranfaftions, which had for fix years been 

 neglefted. He was no lefs attentive to his medical duties 

 in the College, for he projefted and eftablifhed a difpenfary 

 for the poor, fleering fl<ilfully through all the difficulties 

 which ufually attend any fcheme for public benefit, where 

 bodies of men are concerned. The oppofition he encountered 

 gave rife to Dr. Garth's celebrated and beautiful poem of 

 the " Difpenfary," by which alone the memory of thefe 

 contefts, and of moft of the parties engaged, is now pre- 

 ferved. But it is not fo with Sloane. Unfading wreaths, 

 though not of poetic laurel, adorn his buft, and his favourite 

 fcience confecrates his name in one of the moft ftately Weft 

 Indian plants. See Sloanea. 



In 1696, the fubjeft of our memoir publifhed his Latin 

 Catalogue of the Plants of Jamaica, a clofely printed oftavo 

 of 232 pages. He follows Ray's fyftem of arrangement, 

 and is content with referring his fpecies, as well as he could, 

 like that great writer himfelf in his catalogues of Britifh 

 plants, to fome popularly received genus ; in which habit 

 and general refemblance, rather than the ftru<fture of the 

 fruftification, are his guides. In fcientific generic difcrimi- 

 nation indeed, Sloane murt yield the palm to Plumier and 

 many others. His incompetence in this point, rendered him 

 unfit to eftimate the talents of Lmnxus ; when the latter 

 vifited him in 1736, and remarked to Haller, that no bo- 

 tanift in England, except Dillenius, underftood, or cared 

 about, generic charafters. But Sloane is iievertheltTs en- 

 titled to rank high as a literary botanilt from liis uncommon 



attention 



