13 



at the all too early removal of his friend, we cannot 

 doubt, but that circumstance by no means detracts from 

 the value to be attached to them. While recognising 

 to the full the great and brilliant gifts with which Lin- 

 naeus was endowed by nature, we may nevertheless 

 venture without undue temerity to assume that Artedi 

 was very considerably instrumental in assisting him on 

 his path towards distinction as a scientific man. Being 

 by some years the elder of the two, Artedi had already 

 attained, as we have seen, a reputation for learning at 

 the date of Linnaeus' arrival at the university, and was, 

 therefore, in a position to afford him advice and assist- 

 ance of various kinds; he could, in short, become in 

 some wise Linnaeus' teacher and guide as well as his 

 friend and comrade. We have Linnaeus' own authority 

 for knowing that Artedi was always most willing and 

 eager to lend him all the aid he possibly could. Doubt- 

 less the most fruitful feature of their intercourse to- 

 gether was those frequent talks they had in each other's 

 rooms, when they had an opportunity of communica- 

 ting to one another and discussing what they had each 

 been engaged in learning or studying, and of disputing 

 about the conclusions they were themselves to come 

 to upon each matter in hand. On those occasions the 

 various opinions and statements of their predecessors 

 in natural history investigation were keenly debated, 

 new theories were evolved and criticised, and ultimately 

 approved or discarded. 



The two young men differed so much in disposi- 

 tion, and their abilities were so widely diverse in cha- 

 racter, that they complemented one another in a singu- 

 larly happy manner. Linnaeus, "small of stature, bois- 

 terous, hasty and of ready wit", as he characterises 

 himself in his youth, was possessed, we may be sure, 

 of a more active imagination and was consequently the 

 readier with new ideas or theories, whereas the some- 

 what sluggish Artedi was more deliberate, though al- 

 ways more severely logical, in forming and expressing 

 his judgments. Hence it might often happen that the 



