lO 



INFANCY OF 



ever had. As her Charles had renounced the cassock, she hoped 

 at least to have the pleasure of seeing it one day on Sammy's shoulders. 

 But this stripling began likewise to imitate his brother's example, and 

 to love flowers better than books of divinity. His mother, to suppress 

 this rising inclination, forbade him most carefully the garden and the ga- 

 thering of flowers. Her prohibition, however, would but little avail 

 vith Samuel to root out the impulse to the knowledge of Nature, 

 which he afterwards made his favourite study, besides husbandry. He 

 shone as one of the most eminent connoisseurs and authors in one of 

 the branches of natural science. In the year 1768 he published a work 

 on the breeding of bees, which met with so favourable a reception, 

 that they gave the author the name of King of the Bees (Bi Kung), 

 The spiritual wishes of the mother were, however, ultimately accom- 

 plished in her second son. He became a preacher in the year 1741, 

 and seven years after, on his father's demise, succeeded him in the 

 reftory of Stenbrohult. 



Meanwhile our Linn^us entered with freedom the career, in which 

 he could thus far advance only by secret and interrupted steps. The 

 certainty and hmitation of a settled plan of pursuits doubled his zeal 

 and spirit, which were under a sure and direS guidance. Rothmann 

 became his leader. He gave him private instruQion in the elements 

 of physic, a circumstance particularly advantageous, and soon at^- 

 tended with happy consequences. Linn^us found in Rothmann's 

 library the first resources, that procured to him erudition and elucida- 

 tions in the science, which he had till then studied without a plan, ox 

 any scientific insight. Among these resources was the principal work of 

 TouRNEFORT, entitled, « Elements of Botany ( Institutiones Rei Herba- 



