42 



MEMORIALS OF RAY : 



left behind him, particularly of what he had done about 

 fishes ; which, being noble materials, but indigested and 

 confused, Mr. Ray was at no small trouble to pat them 

 into that complete order that was necessary for the press; 

 which he had done about the year 1684, as he saith in a 

 letter to Dr. Tancred Robinson, of February the 18th, 

 1684 ; where he tells him, that he had extracted out of 

 Mr. Willughby's papers, revised, supplied, methodized, 

 and fitted for the press, the ' Ichthyology,' and promised 

 to send it to the Doctor ; and it being accordingly soon 

 after sent, it was by him communicated to the Royal 

 Society, who, thinking so good a work worthy to be 

 pubhshed, did, by the help of Bishop Fell,* get it printed 

 at the theatre in Oxford, the Royal Society bearing the 

 charge, and the cuts being engraved at the cost of divers 

 worthy members of that illustrious body. 



In July, 1685, this book was put to the press, and in 

 April following it was finished and came abroad. 



This ' History of Fishes,' as well as that of ' Birds,' 

 (although the completest in their kinds of any extant) 

 lost a great deal of their perfection by the unfortunate 

 miscarriage of Mr. Willughby's and Mr. Ray's papers in 

 their travels ; who had very accurately described all the 

 birds, fishes, &c. which they saw, as they passed through 

 High and Low Germany, especially those in and upon the 

 Danube and the Rhine ; but lost them in their return 

 from thence. t 



Mr. Ray having now, for some years, betaken himself 

 to a retired, studious, and sedentary way of living, 



and animals are described in the second volume. He mentions in his pre- 

 face that the whole undertaking had been submitted to Eay, and met with 

 his approval, though it did not receive any emendations from him. A small 

 Latin catalogue of the plants of Jamaica had been publislied by him in 1696, 

 and serves as a sort of index to the large work. Notwithstanding his dili- 

 gence in studying natural history, Sir H. Sloane appears not to have fully 

 appreciated the benefits of scientific arrangement, and contents himself in 

 his writings with referring plants to genera and species already known, and 

 made no attempt to improve the very defective classification of that day. 



* Fell, Dr. John, was born in Berkshire, in 1635. He was the brother- 

 in-law of Dr. Willis. He was made Bishop of Oxford in 1675, and died 

 July 10th, 1686. f See Letters. 



