VISIT TO ENGLAND 
155 
mission and means to undertake this journey, but did 
not wish Linnaeus to stay away too long. The agree¬ 
ment was made that the journey should not take more 
than eight weeks, of which two were reckoned for 
outward and homeward voyages. This agreement was 
soon found impossible to keep. On the 21st July, 
Amsterdam was left, and after a visit to Boerhaave’s 
country seat and Leyden, Linnaeus arrived at 
Rotterdam on the following day. On his departure 
the wind was so unfavourable, that it required nearly 
a whole week to get to London. On landing, he 
took up his abode with the pastor of the Swedish 
church, Tobias Bjork, in Princes Square, near 
Ratcliff Highway. 
Amongst those first visited by Linnaeus, was the 
President of the Royal Society, Sir Hans Sloane, 
who, for bringing together his world-renowned natural 
history museum, had of his own private means spent 
no less than ,£50,000, and so more than any other 
mortal had gathered a museum whose equal was 
not extant. To this protagonist amongst English 
naturalists, Linnaeus brought with him a recom- 
mendary letter from Boerhaave, in which he testified 
to his great appreciation of Linnaeus, and ascribed to 
him a more than prophetic power. “ Linnaeus, who 
brings you this letter, is particularly worthy of seeing 
you, and of being seen by you. He who sees you 
together, will look upon a pair of men, whose 
like can hardly be found in the world.” Sloane 
invited Linnaeus to go through certain “ herbaria 
viva ” on the 27th July, amongst them being those 
which belonged to Plukenet, Petiver and Camell. 
On the day after, he visited the museum of the Royal 
Society in Dr. Cromwell Mortimer’s company. 
Another acquaintance which Linnaeus especially 
longed to make, was with the administrator of the 
Apothecaries’ garden at Chelsea, Philip Miller; who 
conducted him at once through the garden and 
showed him its rarest plants, employing the then 
