32 



MEMORIALS OF RAY : 



ledge, as well as expect a plentiful return from them : and 

 such are the letters which Mr. Ray abundantly answered ; 

 some of which accounts Mr. Oldenburg published in the 

 ' Philosophical Transactions/ as about St. Paul's battoons, 

 the trochites of mushrooms, maize, the mischiefs of some 

 poisonous plants, the bleeding of trees, and motion of 

 their sap, spontaneous generation, musk-scented insects, 

 the scolopendra, the acid juice of pismires, the darting of 

 spiders, the anatomy of the porpus, the air-bladder in 

 fishes, the macreuse,* and the wood-cracker ; many or 

 most of which particulars Mr. Oldenburg inserted in 

 his 'Transactions.' But Mr. Oldenburg had a farther 

 end in his frequent correspondence with Mr. Ray, which 

 was to get him into the company of those leading diligent 

 members,! who had made an agreement to entertain the 

 Society with a philosophical discourse at their meetings, 

 that so the burden might not lie on two or three, or a few 

 members only ; which request Mr. Ray readily complied 

 with, and accordingly sent him a discourse concerning 

 ' Seeds, and the specific differences of plants which Mr. 

 Oldenburg, in his letter of December the 21st, 1674,j 

 tells him was so well received by the president and those 

 present, that they returned him their thanks, and desired 

 him to let them have more of the like favours from him. 



During this year (1674) and part of the next, Mr. Ray 

 took a great deal of pains to prepare Mr. Willughby's 

 observations about ' Birds' for the press. 



These observations Mr. Willughby had rhapsodically 

 written in Latin, as he did most of his other things, and 

 for this reason, it was first published in that language, in 

 the latter end of the year 1675. And although Mr. 

 Willughby had done a gread deal, yet Mr. Ray was at no 

 small labour to finish the book, by revising the whole, 

 digesting it into order, and supplying from authors and 

 his own observations what was wanting therein, Mr. 

 Willughby not having had time to do it. For although 



* See the Letters, 



t Ibid. 



X Ibid. 



