CHAP. sent at some of the public lectures, he told us that Professor Thunberg, the successor of Linnæus in the Botanical chair, was at this moment Thunberg. delivering a lecture. We hastened to the spot; and found this venerable man, so well known for the account he has published of his Travels Garden. in Japan, in the old Botanic Garden, opposite Botanic the identical house, or cottage, where Linnæus once resided; and in which Professor Thunberg now lived. The lecture was given in the Old Green-house, as it used to be by Linnæus, in the Swedish language; and with such animation of manner, that we much regretted our incapacity to keep pace with the Professor in his harangue. Some of it we understood: it was upon the interesting subject of the "superba Palmarum familia" of Linnæus; and immediately brought to our recollection the observations with which he terminates the Prolegomena of his valuable Flora Lapponica'. But what was our surprise, to find the Professor with only half-adozen slovenly boys standing around him, as (2) "Calidissimos orbis partes regit superba PALMARUM familia; terras calidas incolunt FRUTESCENTES plantarum gentes; australes Europæ plagas numerosa ornat HERBARUM corona; Belgium, Daniamque, GRAMINUM Occupant copiæ; Sueciam, MUSCORUM agmina; ultimam vero frigidissimamque Lapponiam pallidæ ALGE, præsertim albi Lichenes. En ultimum vegetationis gradum in terra ultima!"-Flor. Lapp. in fin. Proleg. p. 26. Amst. 1737. CHAP. his audience, the eldest of whom could not be I. - more than fourteen years of age,-whose whole interest in the lecture seemed to consist in watching for the moment when a palm-branch was cast among them by the Professor, for which they scrambled; being eager to cut these branches with their knives, for the purpose of making them serve as walking-staves. After the lecture was over, the boys scampered off with their palm-sticks, and the Professor kindly admitted us to see his cabinet of rarities. The account of his voyage to Japan was published in 1791, and translated into German. An English edition of the same work has since appeared in our own country. His cabinet consisted of a large collection of objects of natural history, shells, birds, quadrupeds, insects, plants, and minerals. The last were not numerous; and they were, in some instances, described under false names: for having presented to us a small quantity of what he considered as the granular tin of Japan, we found it, upon examination, to be an oxide of Titanium. Among the insects we noticed a magnificent butterfly, the Atlas of Ceylon, measuring nine inches across its extended wings: also a most beautiful little stag, from the island of Java, not more than twelve inches in height. His col spe lection of plants contained twenty thousand cimens. We saw also specimens of the caméo work of the Chinese, which seem to prove that this curious branch of sculpture has been long known in that country; whence, perhaps, the art of cutting caméos was originally derived by the antient and modern nations of the Western world. The Chinese caméos are executed in alabaster and in trap, and sometimes exhibit layers of three distinct colours. One in the possession of Professor Thunberg, representing fruit and flowers, executed in trap, was of three coloursred, green, and white; and it measured twenty inches by sixteen. At this time, Professor Thunberg was preparing for the press a new edition of his Flora Japonica. CHAP. I. Some of the students who had remained in the Green-house afterwards accompanied us in our examination of the BOTANIC GARDEN. We Botanic Garden, found a head-gardener employed, with two assistants acting under his direction. The principal gardener obligingly presented to us a specimen of Lopezia racemosa, a very rare plant from Peru, with a delicate and beautiful red flower, belonging to the class Monandria Monogynia, of which so few are known. It is not noticed by Martyn, in his edition of Miller's Dictionary, CHAP. although mentioned in the Catalogue of Green I. Chemical Schools. house and Stove Plants prefixed to that work. We have since seen it in the Garden at Cambridge. Among the forced plants, we were not a little surprised to find the common English yewtree (Taxus baccata), growing in pots. It is native in one place only in all Sweden, where it appears dwindled to a small shrub. The greenhouses were small, but neat, and kept in good order. It was said that the old garden would soon be destroyed: yet, as a spot sacred to the memory of Linnæus, this ought, surely, to be preserved. In the adjoining buildings there was a small menagerie, where a few live animals were preserved; as an ape, a parroquet, &c.; but there was nothing worth more particular notice. Afterwards we saw the Chemical Schools in the house of Professor John Afzelius, brother of Adam Afzelius the botanist, whom we had before visited. He was delivering a lecture, at the time of our arrival, to about twenty or thirty students; but in a voice so low and inaudible, as to be scarcely intelligible, even to those who were his constant hearers. We observed a few among them making notes; but the chief part of the audience seemed to be very inattentive, and to be sitting rather as a matter of form than for any I. purpose of instruction. Their slovenly dress, and CHAP. manner, were moreover so unlike that of the students in our English Universities, that it was impossible to consider them as gentlemen: they had rather the air and appearance of so many labouring artificers, and might have been mistaken for a company of workmen in a manufactory. Around this chemical lecture-room was Mineralogical Colarranged the Professor's collection of minerals,- fection. perhaps more worthy of notice than any thing else in Upsala; for the Chemical Laboratory scarcely merits attention. It was classed according to the methodical distribution of Cronstedt, and has been in the possession of the University ever since the middle of the eighteenth century. The celebrated Bergmann added considerably to this collection, which may be considered as one of the most complete in Europe; especially in specimens from the Swedish mines, which have long produced the most remarkable minerals in the world. One cabinet alone contained three thousand specimens; and the whole series occupied no less a number than forty. It is true, that, in this immense collection, there were many things denoting an earlier period in the history of mineralogy, and which now belong rather to the study of geology than of mineralogy. One small cabinet contained |