ACCOUNTS RESPECTING LINN^US. 403 



having been destined for sale, and my description having been sent to 

 several amateurs in foreign countries, it so happened that it fell into 

 the hands of the Oueen of Sweden^ the sister of Frederick, the 

 Great, whose love of natural history was so conspicuous. Another 

 copy of my work being at the same time transmitted to the celebrated 

 Count ScHEFFER, govcmor to the late King, he could not help 

 communicating it likewise to his favourite Linn.^us. 



GusTAvus the Great, then Prince Royal, went two years after 

 to France, accompanied by his governor. The latter introduced me to 

 this Prince during his stay at Hamburgh, which lasted from the 23d to 

 the 30th of December of the same year. Several precious stones, 

 very scarce, and partly unknown, amongst others the Asterlas, whose 

 wonderful appearance I had first discovered shortly before in 1770$ 

 and which I illustrated afterwards, besides many other valuable pro- 

 ductions of nature, which I had the honour on that ©ccasion to show 



countries of Europe. He made several valuable discoveries, especially that of the rainbow- 

 coloured agate and the Asterias of Pliny, which the curious had considered as a nonentity. 

 He composed a treatise upon the Asterias, which was read with universal applause at the 

 meeting of the Academy of Sciences at St. Pt-tersburgh \ and Frederick the Gieat of 

 .Prussia was so pleased with it, that he sent Mr. Schultz a most flattering r.ote in his own 

 hand writing, in which he thanked him for his discovery. The present .King oi Prussia pre- 

 sented him also with two gold medals, which he received from tlie liands of Count Von 

 Herzberg. He first gave the best description of tlie gem called the oculus inundi. 

 It was doubtful whether that gem was the work of nature or of art; but iVIr. Sckultz 

 proved it to be a natural production, by a treatise which was read in the Royal Academy of 

 Sciences at Paris in 1776. Prince Frederick of Bruns'wick also complimented him in a 

 letter on the revival of the Asterias of Pliny. While he was at Paris he bought of an ig- 

 norant person a crystal of Madagascar, for the sum of three Louis d'ors, v>'hich represented 

 in its internal strufture tlie perfedl form of a net. The great mineralogist, Delisle, soon 

 after offered him 4.000 livres for it, on the part of tlie late Qiieen of France.— a naturalist, 

 his knowledge was of the first rate, and his merits are acknowledged by the first literati of the 

 age. 



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and 



