TO DAY IN HISTORY

Southland Times, Issue 20494, 24 May 1928, Page 6

TO DAY IN HISTORY

MAY 24. Empire Day. Born: Bishop Jewel, 1522; Charles van Linne (Linnaeusi, naturalist, 1707; Sir Robert Adair, ambassador, 1763; John Henry Foley, artist, Dublin, 1818; Queen Victoria at Kensington, 1819. Died: Pope Gregory VII, 1085; Nicolas Copernicus, astronomer at Thorn, Prussia, 1543; Robert Cecil, Earl of Salisbury, Minister to James 1., 1612; Sir William Read, false doctor, 1715; George Brydges, Lord Rodney, naval commander, 1792; Miss Jane Porter, novelist at Bristol, 1850. Events: Act of Toleration for Dissenters passed in Britain, 1689; Empire Day proclaimed in New Zealand, 1903; Last German attack in the Second Battle of Ypres, nine hours truce at Anzac to bury the dead, 1915; New Military Ser* vice Bill passed by British Parliament, great battle on Verdun front, Germans regain ruins of Fort Donaumont, 1916; first homeward bound Atlantic convoy started, 1917. Jane Porter born in Durham in 1776, was brought up in Edinburgh where she achieved a marked success with her first novel in 1803, “Thaddeus of Warsaw.” This was followed in 1810 by “The Scottish Chiefs,” the hero of which is William Wallace. Among her other works are “The Pastor’s Fireside” (1815) and “Sir Edward Seaward’s Narrative.” Sir William Read, originally a tailor or a cobbler, obtained a great reputation as a doctor, principally ns an eye specialist. He declared that blindness vanished before him, and certainly had an immense following, obtaining to great wealth as a result of his operations. Queen Anne and George I were among his patients. Dr. Radcliffe mentions Read as “Read the Mountebank, who has assurance enough to come to our table upstairs at Garraway’s, swears he’ll stake his coach and six horses, his two blacks and as many silver trumpets, against a dinner at Pontacks.” Read died at Rochester on May 24, 1715. After Queen Anne had knighted him and Dr. Haines, these lines appeared: The Queen, like Heav’n, shines equally on all, Her favours now without distinction fall: Great Read and slender Haines, both, knighted, show That none their honours shall to merit owe. That Popish doctrine is exploded quite, Or Ralph had been no duke, and Read no knight That none their virtue or their learning plead, This has no grace, and that can hardly read. The Ralph was the first Duke of Montague. LINN/EUS. Carl Linne (usually Latinized as Linnaeus I was born at Rashalt, a hamlet in the south of Sweden, on May 24, 1707. His father, a clergyman, and his uncle had both a passion for horticulture, and they early inspired the child with their own spirit. It was resolved to make him a physician, and at the age of twenty he was sent to the University of Lund, where ‘He was less known for his knowledge of natural history than for his ignorance of everything else.” By good fortune he became a lodger in the house of the professor of medicine, Dr. Stoboeus, who, discerning genius where others saw stupidity, gave Linne the free range of his library and museum and treated him with all the kindness of a father. In this genial atmosphere he came to the determination to spend his life in the study of nature, a resolve from which neither poverty nor misery ever moved him. To the regret of Stoboeus he left Lund for Upsala, thinking that it was a better university. His father could allow him no more than eight pounds a year. Celsius, the Professor of Divinity, himself a botanist, discovered Linne one day in the academical garden intently examining a plant, and, entering into conversation with the poor student, surprise followed surprise as the extent of his knowledge revealed itself. He led Linne to Rudbeck the Professor of Botany, who took him into his house as tutor to his children, and allowed him to lecture as his deputy. In the quiet of Rudbeck’s library, Linne first conceived those schemes of classification by which he was to revolutionize botanical science: On the 12th of May, 1732, he set forth on his celebrated journey to Lapland, travelling 4,000 miles, and bringing back upwards of one hundred plants before unknown or undescribed. The university rewarded him with £lO, his travelling expenses. lie went to Holland and while ther# some of his most famous works, including “Critica Botanica,” were printed. From Holland he made an excursion to England but was disappointed, alike by his reception by English botanists, and in the state of their collections as compared with the Dutch. There is a tradition that when he first saw the golden bloom of the furze on Putney Heath, he fell on his knees enraptured by the sight. He vainly endeavoured to preserve some specimens of the plant through the Swedish winter. Oh his return to Sweden he married and commenced business at Stockholm as a physician; but in 1740 he was called to Upsala as professor of medicine, and shortly afterwards was transferred to the chair of botany. In Upsala as professor and physician he spent the remaining thirtyeight years of his life. Honours from all nations and wealth flowed freely unto him. The king raised him to nobility and he took the title of van Linne. Ease, however, induced no cessation of his old habit of industry. To the end he laboured incessantly. He died on the 10th of January, 1778, closing in a blaze of honour and renown a life which had commenced in obscurity and poverty.