Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 14.djvu/698

 674 L I N L I N Henceforward his life was a continuous course of pro sperity, his time being taken up by teaching and the prepara tion of other works. In the year 1745 he issued his Flora Suecica and Fauna Suecica, the latter having occupied his attention during fifteen years ; afterwards, two volumes of observations made during journeys in Sweden, Wdstgota Resa, Stockholm, 1747, and Skanska Resa, Stockholm, 1751. He examined the collections made many years before in Ceylon by Hermann, the full publication taking place in his Flora Zeylanica, Stockholm, 1747. In 1748 he brought out his Hortus Upsaliensis, showing that he had added eleven hundred species to those formerly in cultiva tion in that garden. In 1750 his Philosophia Botanica was given to the world; it consists of a commentary on the various axioms he had published in 1735 in his Funda- menta Botanica, and was dictated to his pupil Lofling, while the professor was confined to his bed by an attack of gout so violent as to threaten his life ; he attributed his recovery to eating plentifully of wood-strawberries, a regimen he afterwards carefully observed. A much slighter attack in the following year was mainly cured by the pleasure caused by Kalm bringing home many new plants from Canada. He catalogued the Queen s Museum at Drotningholm, and the King s at Ulrichsdal, but the most important work of this period of his life is unquestionably his Species Planta- rum, Stockholm, 1753, a second edition being issued in 1762. In this volume the trivial names are fully set forth ; although they had been previously shadowed forth by Linnaeus and others, yet to him belongs the merit of establishing the use of a single epithet in addition to the generic name. In the same year Linnaeus was created knight of the Polar Star, the first time a scientific man had been raised to that honour in Sweden. In 1755 he was invited by the king of Spain to settle in that country, with a liberal salary, and full liberty of conscience, but he declined on the ground that whatever merits he possessed should be devoted to his country s service ; Lofling was sent instead, but died within two years. He was enabled now to purchase the estates of Sofja and Hammarby ; at the latter he built his museum of stone, to guard against loss by fire. His lectures at the university drew men from all parts of the world ; the normal number of students at Upsala was five hundred, whilst he occupied the chair of botany there it rose to fifteen hundred. In 1761 a patent of nobility was granted, antedated to 1757, from which time Linnaeus was styled Carl von Linne&quot; ; his arms were those now borne by the Linnean Society of London. To his great delight the tea plant was introduced alive into Europe in 1763 ; this year also his son Carl was allowed to assist his father in his professorial duties, and to be trained as his successor. 1 At the age of sixty Linnet s memory began to fail ; an apoplectic attack in 1774 greatly weakened him; two years after he lost the use of his right side ; and he died 1 Carl von Linne the younger, the elder son of the distinguished naturalist, was born at Fahlun, 20th January 1741. Delicate in con stitution, he seemed to be oppressed with his father s reputation and his having to support it. He published two decades of new plants, and three dissertations, contributing also some descriptions to the first edition of Aiton s Hortus Kewensis, at the time of his visit to England. He died unmarried at Upsala, 1st November 1783 ; and, his only brother Johan having died in infancy, the succession became extinct in the male line. His mother sold the collections and books of father and son to Dr. J. E. Smith, the first president of the Linnean Society of London. When Smith died in 1828, a subscription was raised to purchase the herbarium and library for the Society, whose property they now remain. Smith sold the collection of minerals in 1796, and added many insects to the Linnean types, but the herbarium is practi cally in the same state as when the elder Linne himself last used it. The manuscripts of most of his publications, and the letters he received from his contemporaries, are likewise in the possession of the Society. 10th January 1778, of an ulceration of the bladder. He was buried in the cathedral of Upsala, with every token of universal regret. In person Linnaeus was described as of medium height, with large limbs, brown piercing eyes, and acute vision, and quick-tempered. He was accustomed to sleep five hours in summer and ten in winter. He lived simply, acted promptly, and noted down his observations at the moment. His handwriting was peculiar, and not very easy to read ; copies of Ids own books were interleaved and copiously annotated, every new discovery being posted into its proper place at once, so that new editions were readily prepared when wanted. With him arrangement seems to have been a passion ; he delighted in devising classilications ; not only did he systematise the three kingdoms of nature, but even drew up a treatise on the Genera Morborum. He found biology a chaos ; he left it a cosmos. When he appeared upon the scene, new plants and animals were in course of daily discovery in increasing numbers, due to the increase of trading facilities; he devised schemes of arrangement by which these acquisitions might be sorted provisionally, until their natural affinities should have become clearer. He made many mistakes ; but the honour due to him for having first enunciated the true principles for defining genera and species, and his uniform use of trivial names, will last so long as biology itself endures. His style is terse and laconic ; he methodically treated of each organ in its proper turn ; ho had a special term for each, the meaning of which did not vary, so that the term did not suggest two ideas at once. The reader cannot doubt the author s intention ; his sentences are business-like, and to the point. The omission of the verb in his descriptions was an innovation, and gave an abruptness to his language which was foreign to the writing of his time ; but it probably by its succinctness added to the popularity of his works. By his force of character he shifted the scientific centre of gravity during his life to a small town in Sweden ; he was constantly receiving presents and praise from crowds of correspondents in every civilized country and in every station of life ; hence it is not surprising that this universal homage should have bred the vanity which disfigures the latter part of his diary. No modern naturalist has impressed his own character with greater force upon his pupils than did Linnaeus. He imbued them with his own intense acquisitiveness, reared them in an atmosphere of enthusiasm, trained them to close and accurate observation, and then dispatched them to various parts of the globe. His students being drawn from many quarters, he had an extensive choice ; some fell victims to fatigue and unkindly climates, but there was no lack of successors. With these young enthusiasts their master s lore was like a gospel ; they were eager to extend the knowledge of it, and to contribute to its richness. The published works of Linnaeus amount to more than one hundred and eighty, including the Amcenitates Academics, for which lie provided the material, revising them also for press ; corrections in his handwriting may be seen in the Banksian and Linnean Society s libraries. His correspondence was wide and copious. Some of his letters have been published, but the bulk of them remains inedited. Many works remain in MS. ; some have lately been published, such as the Flora Dalccarlica, and the Svenslea Arbctcn, both edited by Dr Ewald Ahrling ; those which were issued during the author s life are enumerated by Dr Pulteney in his General View of the Writings of Linnaeus. (B. D. J.) LINNELL, JOHN (1792-1882), a richly gifted English painter, was born in London on the 16th of June 1792. His father being a carver and gilder, Linnell was early brought into contact with artists, and when he was ten years old he was already drawing and selling his portraits in chalk and pencil. His first artistic instruction was received from Benjamin West, and he spent a year in the house of John Varley the water-colour painter, where he had William Hunt and Mulready as fellow pupils, and made the acquaintance of Shelley, Godwin, and other men of mark and individuality. In 1805 he was admitted a student of the Royal Academy, where he obtained medals for drawing, modelling, and sculpture. He was also trained as an engraver, and executed a transcript of the Burial of Saul, one of Varley s most impressive pictures. In after life he frequently occupied himself with the burin, publishing, in 1834, a series of outlines from Michelangelo s frescos in the Sistine chapel, and, in 1840, superintending the issue of a selection of plates from the pictures in Buckingham Palace, one of them, a Titian landscape, being mezzotinted by himself. At first he supported himself mainly by miniature painting, and by the execution of