52 
MEMOIR OP RA.Y. 
1696, with the addition of more than a hundred 
species, and a history and arrangement of mosses, 
mushrooms, fuci, and other cryptogamous plants. 
The edition now most in use, is that published many 
years after the author’s death by the celebrated 
Dillenius. 
Although our accomplished naturalist was so 
much occupied with his botanical labours, and writes 
to one of his correspondents that he resembled him 
who said, Pectora nostra duas non admittentia curas, 
yet such was his industry, that he was enabled to 
prepare for the press the valuable but incomplete 
and ill-digested materials left by Mr Willughby for 
a general history of fishes. As the pecuniary aid 
which was liberally contributed by Willughby’s re- 
lations to the former work was in this instance with- 
held, the book was printed, through the interest of 
Bishop Fell, at the theatre in Oxford, and the ex- 
pense of the plates defrayed by several members of 
the Royal Society. The Historia Piscium forms a 
folio volume, and is illustrated by 188 plates. It is 
a valuable contribution to the natural history of a 
class of animals which, after quadrupeds, are of the 
greatest utility to man, but which are less known, 
notwithstanding the recent exertions of Lacepede, 
Cuvier, and Valenciennes, than any other depart- 
ment of the animal kingdom. 
It had always been matter of deep regret to Ray 
that he was prevented from engaging in the active 
duties of his profession : his earnest desire to pro- 
