HIS CHILDREN 
319 
days after, however, he wrote to Back “ I have received 
my daughter up out of the grave, when both feet were 
in it, up to the knees. She is now out of all danger 
with this remittent fever/’ Thus he retained his 
beloved child, who in her liveliness and gaiety, 
excelled all of her own age. 
But the especial favourite seems to have been the 
youngest, Sophia, possibly from the time of her birth. 
In 1757 he wrote to Back, “ On Tuesday evening my 
wife was delivered of a daughter after severe labour. 
The girl was apparently stillborn, but we used 
artificial respiration and after a quarter of an hour she 
showed signs of life, and is now tolerably well. My 
wife is still weak. God help her/’ 
Sophia became his special darling. When she 
grew older, he often took her to his lectures, where 
she remained all the time between his knees; some¬ 
times her head, neck, and arms being bare, that she 
should not catch cold he tied his handkerchief round 
her neck. She was also protected by him from the 
mother’s roughness. Once when going upstairs with 
a pile of crockery she chanced to fall down and break 
all the pieces. In her distress she ran to her father, 
who bade her not to be sorry at the accident, himself 
going out and buying new porcelain. It can easily be 
imagined that Madame Linne opened her eyes at 
dinner time, and suspected that Sophia had “ done it 
again,” but was assured that the old porcelain was so 
ugly, he had broken it and bought more in its place. 
His eldest daughter, Elizabeth Christina, was 
married on the 24th June, 1764, to Carl Fr. Bergen- 
crantz, a lieutenant in the Upland Regiment. The 
marriage was unfortunate, owing to the brutality and 
laxity of her husband, so the wife escaped to her 
parents with her little girl. As Linne’s daughters 
were now grown up, the granddaughter, as the 
smallest, became the object of Linne’s special regard. 
Other relations visited Uppsala, as for instance 
Samuel Linnaeus in 1741, and later, his very poor 
