18 



of the extreme kindness and consideration he had been 

 the recipient of from him in particular. His stay in 

 England, however, had almost exhausted his resources, 

 and he informed LiNNiEUS of the great anxiety he was 

 in lest his means should not allow of his spending the 

 requisite time in Holland and procuring the necessary 

 books for qualifying himself for the degree he was de- 

 sirous of obtaining before returning to Sweden; he was, 

 indeed, afraid he would be obliged to go home without 

 further delay. Another fate was, however, in store for 

 him. 



At that time there was living at Amsterdam a 

 wealthy chemist of the name of Albert Seba. 1 He had 

 made himself a name as a natural scientist by reason 

 of the zoological collections he had got together, which 

 for that age were exceedingly large and notable. The 

 various valuable specimens in these collections he was 

 anxious to have reproduced in print with elucidatory 

 descriptions; two bulky folios had already (in 1735) ap- 

 peared, dealing with Quadrupeds and Snakes, and now 

 he was desirous of getting Fishes (& Lower Animals) 

 treated in like manner for a third folio volume. Owing, 

 however, to increasing age and feebleness, he felt un- 

 able to accomplish that himself single-handed, and was 

 therefore on the look-out for a likely collaborator. 

 Linnaeus had been requested to undertake the task, but 

 had declined owing to other work in which he was 

 more interested, Fishes being by no means a favourite 

 study of his. On meeting Artedi, though, he recalled 

 to mind the request which Seba had made to him, and 

 in the full persuasion that no better collaborator could 

 be found for the work in hand, he induced Artedi to 

 return to Amsterdam with him and offer Seba his ser- 

 vices. The assumption was, naturally, that the remuner- 

 ation offered would be liberal, and that Artedi would 

 thereby be placed in a position to carry out the ar- 

 dently cherished wish of getting his doctorship before 

 leaving Holland. 



1 Born 1665. Died 1736. 



