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Coxn’s TRAVELS IN DENMARK. 319
the whole number will nearly amount to one thoufand eight hundred fpecies; of which
more than five hundred and feventy are of the clafs Cryptogamia, or that which con-
tains the ferns, mofles, alge, and fungi. hat any curious perfons, yet unacquainted
with this work, may judge how far it might be fubfervient to their knowledge of Enge-
lifh botany, it may be added, that out of nine hundred and eighty fpecies already eure
in the fifteen firlt fa/cicw/7, more than feven hundred are {pontaneoully produced in.
Britain.
Magnificent and accurate as this work is, and though conduéted at the King’s ex-
pence, truth will not be offended by afferting, that the execution of it is {till inferior to
a performance of the fame kind now publifhing in England, at the rifk of an individual,
I allude to Curtis’s Fora Londinenfis; which, for the magnitude of the plates, the nice
difcrimination and figures of the fructification, has not been paralleled by any other
publication of fuch {cope and defign: nor is the merit of the Flora Londinen/is confined
to the accurate elegance of the plates; it contains a minute defcription of each plant,
and is enriched by fcientific, ufeful, and ceconomical obfervations, either extraéted from
the beft writers, or derived from the extenfive knowledge of its author. It is but jut-
tice to add, that the minute plants of the clafs Cryptogamia, in the delineation of which
the Mora Danica is extremely deficient, are figured with the utmoft exaétnefs by Mr.
Curtis, who introduced to the Englith botanift five new fpecies of agarici*.
Chriftian Oeder, to whom, through the liberality of his monarch, we are indebted
for the Mora Danica, was the pupil and friend of the celebrated Haller, under whom
he was educated at Gottingen. According to Dr. Nugent’s account of Oeder +, he
vifited England in his younger days, and acquired a great knowledge of the language.
Whilft ftudent at Gottingen, he tranflated all the Englith treatifes for a Latin edition.
of Dr. Mead’s works, which Haller publifhed in 2 vols. 8vo. in 1748. The fucceedine
year he took his doctor’s degree in phyfic, and wrote, on that occafion, a thefis, which
Haller calls “* Docta Differtatio contra Revulfionem & Derivationem.” In 1752, at which
period he was fettled at Copenhagen, the Royal Academy of Sciences at Gottingen
named him a correfpondent member ; and foon after he was made fuperintendant of
the botanincal garden at Copenhagen, and profeffor of botany. In 1752, Oeder pre-
fided at the public difputation of Dr. Peter Afcanius, and took that occafion to write on
irritability ; a fubject on which the experiments and obfervations of his great mafter had
drawn the attention of anatomifts and phyficians.
Having performed many journies into the different provinces of Denmark, accompa-
nied by a draughtfman, and colleéted great materials for the intended Flora, he pub-
lithed, in 1762, the firft fa/ciculus ; and in 1764, asa part of his plan, his Elements
of Botany, in 8vo. ‘This work exhibits a profound knowledge of the fubject; and the
author has given the outlines of a new method of arrangement, adapted only to the
plants of Europe. The fecond volume of the Elements was printed in 1766; and is
embellifhed with fourteen excellent plates, explanatory of the techinal part of his fubject.
His fy{tem was intended to comprife eight claffes: 1. Cryptanthere ; 2. Monocotyle-
dones ; 3. Amentaceae ; 4. Incomplete ; 5. Calycarpe ; 6. Calycantheme ; 7. Monopetala 5
8. Polypetale. Of this fyftem the author has only exemplified the firft clafs, which he
publifhed in a feparate volume in 1770, in 8vo.; and in which are methodically ar-
* A. Oftreatus; Plycatalis ; Glutinofus; Floccofus; Velutipes—Mr. Curtis publithed only two vo-
jumes of this {plendid work, which has been interrupted by his death, which happened in 1799:
+ See Nugent’s Travels through Germany, vol, i.
ranged
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