LAST YEARS 333 
right side, but his cure came again from strawberries. 
After a few uneventful years as regards illness, he 
had symptoms of scurvy in 1756, and gave up coffee 
for a whole month. During the following years, 
in 1764 he had pleurisy; in 1767, he was yery weak 
for six months, an attack of Uppsala fever following. 
In 1770, and each year after, he was not without 
some sickness. At the beginning of 1772, he in¬ 
formed Back that his end was approaching, appre¬ 
hending apoplexy, as his head swam when he bent 
forward. Back prescribed special diet, rest from 
lecturing, lessened work and bleeding. Linne 
promised to follow this advice in part. After some 
rest, he declared that giving up lecturing was im¬ 
possible, as it made him forget things, rendering him 
dumb, and had he continued so another term, he 
might have forgotten his own name. 
In the early part of 1773, Linne suffered from an 
angina, and later from sciatica, “ from the hip to the 
knee.” May 1774, when he was lecturing in private, 
he had what he called his first “ messenger of death,” 
a stroke of apoplexy, so that he could not raise 
himself from fiis chair, move himself, nor hold up 
his head; he gradually improved, though slowly. 
Therefore in 1775, he asked for release from lec¬ 
turing, “ because I, old and tottering, can hardly bear 
the autumn cold, and am toothless, so it is hard to 
talk.” 
The early months of 1776 showed gradual but 
continuous deterioration. “ Linne limps, can hardly 
walk, talks confusedly, can scarcely write,” is an 
entry from one of his autobiographies. Three pupils 
came from Denmark and Hamburg. “ But Linne is 
so sick, that he can scarcely speak to them, for he 
also has had tertian in addition to his lameness and 
weakness.” And with this his notes close. 
The increasing weakness of old age and sickness 
necessarily prevented him from fulfilling the duties 
of his chair; therefore in the spring of 1776, there 
