Item data
Item Type:
Document
From:
Gwyn, Nicholas
Sent from:
Ipswich, Suffolk
To:
Smith, Sir James Edward
Sent to location:
Milan, Italy
Summary:
Praises Smith's thesis ["Disputatio Inauguralis quaedam de Generatione complectens"]. Discusses the subject further including apparent suggestions for experiments with chickens and speculation on hereditary traits. Asks Smith to use all his energies in acquiring the "hidden treasures" of [Charles] Plumier's [(1646-1704) French botanist] collections in Paris. Asks Smith to buy any works by [Lorenzo] Bellini [(1643-1704) Italian physician and anatomist] Smith comes across. Possible incorrect classification of 'Clypeola maritima L' into 'Alyssum siculum' and 'Alyssum maritimum'. Asks for second part of [Giovanni Antonio] Scopoli's "Entomology"; [Louis] Gerard's "Flora Gallo-provincialis" and new edition of [Antoine-Joseph Dezallier] D'argenville's "Conchologie". Relates various upcoming periodicals with warning they all precede Smith's. Believes Smith will correct Linnaeus with more temperance than [Lazzaro] Spallanzani or Barrington, criticises Spallanzani's "wretched unnecessary trash". Pleased with books received from Smith but wishes [Sébastien] Vaillant had more figures in ["Botanicon Parisiense"]. Sir Thomas Cullum, Laurence and Priest have abandoned study of botany. Cullum and others in Suffolk want to establish a society to support wives and orphans of physicans, apothecaries and surgeons, Gwyn dismisses it as "relieving the parishes [of] their charges & taking away every spur to frugality and industry". Reports a favourable winter.
Letter date:
27 Feb 1787
Languages:
English
Prev Ref No:
5.48
Additional Information:
Note type | Note |
---|
Additional | Smith replied 9 Sep [1787] |
Finding Aids | Dawson, W R, (1934). "Catalogue of the manuscripts in the Library of The Linnean Society - Part I. The Smith papers: The correspondence and miscellaneous papers of Sir James Edward Smith", London: Linnean Society. |
Related Material | Smith, J E, and Oosterdijk, N G, (1786). "Disputatio physiologica inauguralis. Quaedam de Generatione complectens ... ex auctoritate ... Nicolai Georgii Ooesterdyk, ... submittit Jacobus Eduardus Smith, ..." Lugduni Batavorum: Apud Fratres Murray.
Scopoli, G A, (1763). "Entomologia Carniolica exhibens insecta Carnioliae indigena ..." Vindobonae: Typis Joannis Thomae Trattner.
Gerard, L, (1761). "Flora Gallo-provincialis, Cum Iconibus aeneis." Paris: Apud C. J. B. Bauche.
Dezallier D'Argenville, A J (1780). "La conchyliologie, ou histoire naturelle des coquilles... Par M. Desallier d'Argenville... Troisieme edition... Par MM. de Favanne de Montcervelle, pere & fils." Paris: De Bure.
Vaillant, S, (1727). "Botanicon Parisiense ou denombrement par ordre alphabetique des plantes, qui se trouvent aux environs de Paris ..."Leide & Amsterdam: Verbeck & Lakeman. |