Lives of Eminent Zoologists, from Aristotle to Linnaeus Part 4

FOOTNOTES:

[E] Buffon, Histoire Naturelle, tome i. p. 54, edit. 1785.

[F] See Life of Pliny, by Cuvier, in the Biographie Universelle, tome x.x.xv. p. 70.

GESNER, BELON, SALVIANI, RONDELET, AND ALDROVANDI.

_Zoologists of the Sixteenth Century._

Conrad Gesner--Account of his Life and Writings, preceded by Remarks on those of aelian, Oppian, Albertus Magnus, Paolo Giovio, and Hieronymus Bock--Pierre Belon--Hippolito Salviani--Guillaume Rondelet--Ulysses Aldrovandi--General Remarks on their Writings, and the State of Science at the Close of the Sixteenth Century.

CONRAD GESNER.

From the time of Pliny to the commencement of the sixteenth century, zoology, like the other sciences, made little progress. The only naturalists during the earlier portion of this interval at all deserving of notice are aelian and Oppian. The former was born at Praeneste in the year 160, and wrote in Greek a History of Animals, which, like that of the philosopher of Comum, is disfigured by numerous errors and fables.

The latter was a poet, a native of Cilicia, who lived under the Emperor Caracalla in the beginning of the third century. Two only of his productions are now extant, his Halieuticon and Cynaegeticon; the one containing five books on fis.h.i.+ng, the other, four on hunting. These works are still occasionally consulted, though they afford little useful information, and might without any loss to science be consigned to oblivion.

The princ.i.p.al author who appeared between the epoch which witnessed the destruction of the Roman Empire and the beginning of the century just specified, was Albertus Magnus; so called, according to some, not because he was great as a man of science, but because his family-name was Groot, which in Dutch signifies "great," and being Latinized, as was then the fas.h.i.+on, became "magnus." However, he was not a small personage in his day; for it is told of him that he constructed a brazen head which had the faculty of answering questions, and wrote so many works that, when collected for a general edition at Lyons in 1651, they filled twenty-one thick folios. His character was highly respectable, and his History of Animals is certainly a remarkable production for the age in which he lived. Born at Lavingen in Suabia in 1205, he received his education at Pavia, where he entered the order of Dominicans. Some time having elapsed, he went to Paris and delivered public lectures with applause. In 1248, he was invited to Rome by Pope Alexander III., who appointed him to the office of Master of the Holy Palace, and bestowed on him the bishopric of Ratisbon, which he soon after resigned.

Returning to Cologne, he resumed his lectures, which were much frequented. Pope Gregory X. called him to a.s.sist at the general council, held at Lyons in 1274, where the conclave of cardinals for the election of the successor of St Peter was first inst.i.tuted. He died at Cologne at the age of 77. The celebrated Thomas Aquinas, who was his pupil, is reported to have broken, in a fit of terror, his famous brazen oracle; and the progress of science has shown as little respect to his other works, consisting chiefly of a commentary on Aristotle, with certain additions from the Arabian writers.

Sir Thomas Browne, in his famous Enquiries into Vulgar and Common Errors, thus characterizes our author:--"Albertus, bishop of Ratisbone, for his great learning and lat.i.tude of knowledge sirnamed Magnus, besides divinitie, hath written many Tracts in Philosophie; what we are chiefly to receive with caution, are his naturall Tractates, more especially those of Mineralls, Vegetables, and Animals, which are indeed chiefly Collections out of Aristotle, aelian, and Plinie, and respectively containe many of our popular errors. He was a man who much advanced these opinions by the authoritie of his name, and delivered most conceits, with strickt enquirie into few."

It is scarcely necessary to mention here a work on the fishes of Rome, De Romanis Piscibus, by the celebrated Paolo Giovio, an Italian writer of this age, who was born at Como in the year 1483. It was dedicated to the Cardinal of Bourbon, and appeared in 1524, but is of little or no value, being the production of a person who, although eminent in general literature, had no claims to the character of a naturalist.

Another author who lived at this period, Hieronymus Bock, generally known by his Latinized name Tragus, was princ.i.p.ally distinguished as a botanist, although he wrote also on animals. In 1549, he published a work ent.i.tled Kraeuterbuch von den vier Elementen, Thieren, Voegeln, and Fischen, of which there have been various editions. He was born at Heidesbach at Zweybruecken in 1498, and died, in the 56th year of his age, on the 21st of June 1554.

The sixteenth century produced a little band of worthies, who, without having made great acquirements, may yet be justly styled the fathers of modern zoology. These were Guillaume Rondelet, a physician of Montpellier; Hippolito Salviani, also a physician, and a native of Citta di Castello in Umbria; Conrad Gesner, surnamed the German Pliny, who was born at Zurich, and followed the same profession; Pierre Belon, a Frenchman; and Aldrovandi, professor at Bologna. In presenting a sketch of the lives and labours of these venerable sages, we shall begin with him whom Haller characterizes as a prodigy of knowledge, _monstrum eruditionis_.

Conrad Gesner, one of the most celebrated of this cla.s.s of naturalists, was born at Zurich on the 26th March 1516. His parents were of an humble rank in life, and having several other children, could not have given him the benefit of a good education, had it not been for the kindness of his maternal uncle, a clergyman, who imparted to him the rudiments of knowledge, and instructed him in botany. This relative, however, died while he was yet at an early age; and when not more than fifteen he was also deprived of his father, who was killed at the battle of Zug, in which the celebrated reformer Zuinglius or Zwingle lost his life. The small patrimony left by his parent having been divided among a large family, Gesner was reduced to great distress, which was heightened by a dropsical affection. Recovering from this disease, he resolved to seek his fortune in another country, and going to Strasburg, entered into the service of Wolfgang Fabricius Capito, professor of Hebrew in the university of that city. Soon after, receiving pecuniary a.s.sistance from the canons of Zurich, he betook himself to Bourges, where he commenced the study of medicine. At the age of eighteen, he had occasion to go to Paris, where he indulged to excess his literary appet.i.te, and devoured indiscriminately all kinds of knowledge; being supported meanwhile by a young Bernese n.o.bleman, named Steiger, who had contracted a friends.h.i.+p for him. Soon after, he returned to Strasburg, whence, in 1536, he was recalled to Zurich, to teach some children the elements of grammar, with a salary barely sufficient for his support. In the following year, the magistrates, perceiving the superiority of his character, furnished him with an additional grant of money, which enabled him to go to Basil to prosecute his medical studies. To increase his income he a.s.sisted Phavorinus in editing his Lexicon, and in a short time removed to Lausanne, where the senate of Berne appointed him Greek professor, in which office he continued three years. He then went to Montpellier, where he engaged more particularly in the study of anatomy and botany, and formed an intimate acquaintance with the celebrated Laurent Joubert and the naturalist Rondelet. In 1541, he obtained the degree of doctor in medicine at Basil, where he arranged some extracts respecting botany and physic, taken from Greek and Arabian writers, which were published the following year at Zurich and Lyons; in the former of which places he now took up his residence and engaged in professional practice. Soon afterwards, he published a catalogue of plants in four languages, in which he evinced his extensive knowledge of botany, which was subsequently increased by several excursions among the Alps. In 1545, he made a journey to Venice and Augsburg, where he enjoyed some valuable opportunities of consulting rare works and ma.n.u.scripts. The same year, he commenced the publication of his famous Bibliotheca Universalis, which contains a catalogue of all the works then known, whether extant or lost. Several other fruits of his industry appeared successively between this period and the year 1555, when his merits induced the magistrates of Zurich to appoint him professor of natural history. The Emperor Ferdinand I., to whom he dedicated one of his works, the History of Fishes, rewarded him with various marks of his esteem. These, however, he did not long enjoy, as he fell a victim to a pestilential disease which, commencing at Basil in the spring of 1564, afterwards broke out in his native city with increased violence. When attacked by this fatal malady he betook himself to his cabinet, for the purpose of arranging his papers, and in this occupation died on the 13th December 1565, at the age of 49 years and a few months; leaving a widow who had partic.i.p.ated in his adversity and prosperity, having been married by him when he acted as grammar-teacher at Zurich. He bequeathed his library and ma.n.u.scripts to Caspar Wolf, his pupil, with injunctions to print all that could be rendered fit for the public eye. His princ.i.p.al work is the Historia Naturalis Animalium, chiefly composed of extracts from Aristotle, aelian, and Pliny, without order or discrimination, but intermixed with numerous original observations, and ill.u.s.trated by rude engravings. It consists of five books, and forms four folio volumes. There is an English translation by Topsell of part of it under the name of The History of four-footed Beasts and Serpents, collected out of the Writings of Conradus Gesner. Down to the end of the seventeenth century his compilations were held in the highest estimation in every department of zoology: they are now considered as objects of curiosity rather than stores of useful knowledge.--The three next of whom mention is to be made were chiefly eminent as ichthyologists.

PIERRE BELON.

The three great authors, it has been remarked, who really laid the foundation of modern ichthyology, appeared in the middle of the sixteenth century, and, what is remarkable, almost at the same time: Belon, in 1553; Rondelet, in 1554 and 1555; Salviani, from 1554 to 1558.

Unlike the compilers who, after Aristotle and Theophrastus, swell our list of writers, they saw and examined for themselves the fishes of which they speak, and had drawings of them taken under their immediate inspection with considerable accuracy. Too faithful, however, to the spirit of their time, they took more pains to find out the names which these fishes bore among the ancients, and in selecting fragments for their history, than in describing them in a distinct manner; so that, were it not for the figures, it would in many instances be almost impossible to determine their species.[G]

Scarcely any of the older naturalists, however, confined their attention to one department of their favourite science. Belon was a physician, a zoologist, and a botanist. He was born at Souletiere, in the parish of Oise, in Le Maine, about the year 1518. It is supposed that his parents were poor; and we accordingly find that he was indebted for his education to Rene du Bellay, bishop of Mans, William Duprat, bishop of Clermont, and the Cardinals of Tournon and Lorraine. At an early age, he commenced the study of medicine and botany, and having distinguished himself among the pupils of Valerius Cordus, professor of natural history at Wirtemberg, was allowed to accompany his master on the excursions which he was wont to make into Germany and Bohemia, for the purpose of obtaining specimens. On finis.h.i.+ng his education he travelled through Greece, Egypt, Palestine, and Asia Minor, whence he returned to Paris in 1550, with a valuable collection, after an absence of three years. He now arranged the materials which he had thus procured, and published several interesting works; notwithstanding the merit of which, he experienced great difficulty in obtaining admission into the medical faculty of Paris. In 1557, he undertook another journey into Italy, Savoy, Dauphiny, and Auvergne. On his return, he engaged in a translation of Dioscorides and Theophrastus, and was preparing an important work on agriculture, when he was murdered in the wood of Boulogne, as he was proceeding from Paris to his place of residence at the Chateau de Madrid. This happened in 1564, when he was about forty-five years of age.

His first great performance was the Natural History of Sea Fishes, with wood engravings, containing a figure and description of the dolphin, and several other species of the same family. It was published at Paris in 1551, in quarto. In 1553, he gave to the world another work on fishes, ent.i.tled De Aquat.i.tibus Libri Duo, c.u.m Eiconibus ad Vivam ipsorum Effigiem, which he afterwards translated into French, and with certain additions printed in three different forms in 1555. A work on pines and other evergreen trees, De Arboribus Coniferis, also appeared in 1553, as well as a dissertation on Egyptian antiquities. Soon after he presented to the public his Observations de plusieurs Singularites et Choses memorables, trouvees en Grece, Asie, Judee, Egypte, Arabie et autres Pays etranges, redigees en trois livres, in which are many curious details on the subject of geography, and on the manners of Eastern nations. A treatise on birds was published at Paris in 1555; another, containing representations of animals and plants observed in Arabia and Egypt, was put forth in 1557; which in 1558 was succeeded by an essay on the cultivation of plants. As a botanist, Belon ranks not less highly than as a zoologist; and, to do honour to him in the former capacity, Plumier has dedicated to his memory an American genus, to which he has given the name of _Belonia_.

HIPPOLITO SALVIANI.

The Aquatilium Animalium Historia of Salviani is chiefly remarkable for the beauty of its engravings, some of which have scarcely been surpa.s.sed by the efforts of modern art. The t.i.tlepage bears the date of 1554, but the work was not completed till 1558. It contains descriptions of ninety-nine species of fishes, each including the synonymy, the external appearance of the animal, the places in which it occurs, its habits, the manner in which it is caught and prepared, and its medical properties.

He also points out the pa.s.sages in Aristotle, Pliny, and other ancient writers, who have spoken of them, and to the observations of these authors adds many excellent ones of his own; so that the work, on account of the general accuracy of the plates and descriptions, is one that may be considered indispensable to the modern ichthyologist.

Salviani was born in 1514, at Citta di Castello in Umbria. His family was n.o.ble. After finis.h.i.+ng his studies, he settled at Rome, where he practised medicine, and delivered public lectures. The friends.h.i.+p of Cardinal Cervini obtained for him the appointment of physician to the pope, Julius III. The death of this personage, and that of Cervini, who had been elevated to the apostolic chair, which, however, he occupied only three weeks, were not productive of any serious disadvantage to him, for he was continued in his offices by Paul IV., to whom he dedicated his work. He died at Rome, in 1572, at the age of fifty-eight.

GUILLAUME RONDELET.

Rondelet greatly surpa.s.sed Gesner, Belon, and Salviani, in the extent of his knowledge as an ichthyologist; and although his figures, being only wood-cuts, are inferior in beauty to the copperplate-engravings of the last of these authors, they are yet more correct in the characteristic details. His work is ent.i.tled De Piscibus Marinis Libri XVIII., in quibus vivae piscium imagines expositae sunt, and was published at Lyons in 1554. A second part appeared in 1555, under the name of Universae Aquatilium Historiae Pars Altera, c.u.m veris ipsorum Imaginibus. The first part treats of marine animals, including the cetacea, turtles and seals, the mollusca, and the crustacea. In the second part, sh.e.l.ls, insects, zoophytes, and fresh-water fishes, are described. These objects, although not methodically arranged, are often placed in such a manner as to indicate that the author had some idea of generic affinity.

The anatomical details which he presents are p.r.o.nounced by Cuvier to be frequently correct; but his descriptions, it must be granted, are inferior to the figures, which are truly surprising for the period at which he lived. In reference to the fishes of the Mediterranean this work is indispensable, and, indeed, to the ichthyologist generally it is one of the most important that exists. The descriptions and figures have been copied by Gesner, in his work De Aquatilibus; while Ray, Artedi, and Linnaeus, have obviously profited by them.

Rondelet, the son of an apothecary, was born at Montpellier on the 27th September 1507. Being originally of a very infirm const.i.tution, he was judged incapable of performing a part in active life, and, accordingly, when his father's fortune was distributed, he received a sum merely sufficient to procure his admittance into a convent. As he grew up, however, he improved in strength, and having no affection for a monastic life, he commenced his studies at the age of eighteen, and finished his general education at Paris, where he was supported by his elder brother.

Having resolved to embrace the medical profession, he returned in 1529 to his native city, and afterwards settling at Pertuis, a small village in Provence, he began to practise; but not meeting with success in the healing art, he endeavoured to procure subsistence by setting up a grammar-school. This expedient also failing, he went again to Paris in order to improve his knowledge of the Greek language, and, being unwilling to burden his brother any longer, became tutor to a young n.o.bleman. Some time after, he removed to Maringues, in Auvergne, where he again entered upon practice, and in 1537 received a medical degree at Montpellier. The following year he married a young lady endowed with many estimable qualities, but dest.i.tute of fortune; and, as his brother was dead, this alliance increased his difficulties. However, he settled finally at the place of his birth; and, being a.s.sisted by his wife's sister, began to extend his acquaintance, and succeeded so well in his profession, that, in 1545, he was appointed professor of medicine in the university.

He also obtained the office of physician to the Cardinal of Tournon, whom he accompanied on his missions in France, Italy, and the Low Countries, of which occasions he eagerly availed himself to increase his knowledge of natural history. Returning once more to his usual place of residence he established an anatomical theatre, at which he lectured several hours daily to a numerous audience. His pa.s.sion for dissection was so strong, that he opened one of his own children after death, and this circ.u.mstance has naturally enough given rise to the opinion, that he must have been a man dest.i.tute of sensibility; which, however, does not appear to have been the case. His wife having died in 1560, he soon procured another, poor and handsome like the first. While on a journey to Toulouse he was attacked by dysentery, occasioned by eating too many figs, and he died at Realmont, whither he had gone to visit a patient.

His death happened on the 30th July 1566, in the fifty-ninth year of his age.

He was a man of very small stature, but robust and active. At the age of twenty-five he gave up the use of wine and spirits, from an apprehension of gout; but he compensated for his abstemiousness in these articles by indulging his appet.i.te for fruit and pastry. Although he had acquired considerable sums of money in the practice of his profession, he expended them in the gratification of his taste for building, and in various acts of generosity; so that he left very little behind him.

ULYSSES ALDROVANDI.

One of the most celebrated naturalists of the sixteenth century was Ulysses Aldrovandi, professor at Bologna, who was born in that city in 1527, and died on the 4th of May 1605. He was of a n.o.ble family, and his fortune enabled him to travel extensively, to collect materials for his books, and to employ artists in painting and engraving suitable ill.u.s.trations. He carried, indeed, his liberality in this respect so far, that, having expended his whole fortune in his enthusiastic pursuit of natural history, he left nothing for the support of his old age, and is commonly believed to have died in the hospital of his native city.

Cuvier, in a notice of his life in the Biographie Universelle, regards this circ.u.mstance as doubtful; imagining it improbable that the senate of Bologna, to whom he bequeathed his museum and ma.n.u.scripts, and who laid out large sums after his death in completing the publication of his works, would have left him dest.i.tute during his life. This, however, is mere conjecture; and there is too much reason to fear that, like many other eminent persons, he was abandoned to struggle with misfortune, and not advanced to honour and estimation until after his career was finished, when they could be of no use to him.

The works of Aldrovandi form thirteen folio volumes. Of these, four only were published by himself; namely, three on birds and one on insects.

Immediately after his death, in 1606, his widow put forth a volume on the other white-blooded animals, including testacea and crabs. Cornelius Uterverius, a native of Delft, and his successor in the inst.i.tute of Bologna, revised the work on fishes and whales, which appeared in 1613, as well as that on the quadrupeds with solid hoofs, published in 1616.

In 1621, the History of the Quadrupeds with split Hoofs was edited by Thomas Dempster, a Scottish gentleman, who was also a professor at Bologna. The other treatises, on the viviparous and oviparous digitate quadrupeds, on serpents, monsters, and minerals, were prepared for the press by Bartholomew Ambrosinus, another of his successors, and that on trees by Ovid Montalba.n.u.s. These works underwent a second impression at Bologna, and some of them were subsequently printed at Frankfort. It is difficult to procure a uniform edition, and some of the tracts are much rarer than others.

Aldrovandi was certainly one of the most zealous naturalists of his time; but, although he added considerably to the stock of information, he can only be considered as a laborious collector of materials. Cuvier p.r.o.nounces his works "an enormous compilation without taste or genius,"

and agrees with Buffon in thinking, that were the useless parts removed, they would be reduced to a tenth of their bulk. Moreover, the plan and matter are to a great extent borrowed from Gesner; but in all ages writers on natural history have been so much addicted to the practice of borrowing, that Aldrovandi is hardly to be censured on this account.

Some portions of his museum have successfully struggled with the destructive energies of time, and are still to be seen in the collection of the Inst.i.tute of Bologna. His ma.n.u.scripts, of which there is an immense ma.s.s, are preserved in the public library of the same city; and the drawings from which the engravings for his work were taken were carried, at the time of the Revolution, to the Museum of Natural History at Paris.

Such were the dawnings of zoological science after the revival of learning in Europe. The authors of those times, it is manifest, looked less to nature than to the writings of Aristotle, Pliny, and their other predecessors; so that in their works we find little more than a repet.i.tion of what had been previously said. Their descriptions are rude, frequently incorrect, and in few cases characteristic. They had no idea of disposing the objects of which they treated in a manner resembling that to which we have been accustomed since the period of Ray and Linnaeus. The alphabetical arrangement was followed by some, while others possessed a rude notion of the affinity of species; but although attempts were made to separate the animal creation into cla.s.sic groups, yet from the days of Aristotle to those of Swammerdam, Ray, and Reaumur, we find no traces of the anatomical knowledge necessary for the accomplishment of such an undertaking. We have, indeed, little reason to expect in the writings of the ancients, or in those of the succeeding naturalists, any example of a just cla.s.sification; still we cannot but marvel when we find, that very few of them endeavoured to represent objects as they might have seen them with their own eyes. Whatever may be the causes of this defect, those who are extensively conversant with the publications of our own times must be aware, that the practice of copying from books, instead of having recourse to Nature herself, has not yet been relinquished; though nothing is more clear than that there can be no real progress in natural history without authenticating the observations of preceding writers by examining the objects which they have described, and by noting the particulars in which they are erroneous.

FOOTNOTES:

[G] Cuvier, Hist. Nat. des Poissons.

JONSTON, GOEDART, REDI, AND SWAMMERDAM.

_Zoologists of the Seventeenth Century._

Brief Account of the Lives and Writings of John Jonston, John Goedert, Francis Redi, and John Swammerdam--Notice respecting the princ.i.p.al Works of Swammerdam--His Birth and Education--He studies Medicine, but addicts himself chiefly to the Examination of Insects--Goes to France, where he forms an Acquaintance with Thevenot--Returns to Amsterdam, takes his Degree, improves the Art of making Anatomical Preparations--Publishes various Works--Destroys his Health by the Intensity of his Application--Becomes deeply impressed with religious Ideas--Adopts the Opinions of Antoinette Bourignon--Is tortured by conflicting Pa.s.sions--Endeavours to dispose of his Collections--Is affected with Ague and Anasarca, and dies after protracted Suffering--His Writings published by Boerhaave--His Cla.s.sification of Insects.

JOHN JONSTON.

Of the three kingdoms of nature, the vegetable was that which, down to the time of Linnaeus, had received most attention. Mineralogy could scarcely be said to have commenced. Zoology had indeed made considerable progress; but botany had advanced in a still greater degree, having been cultivated by a host of naturalists, chiefly belonging to the medical profession. One of these, Caesalpinus, who flourished in the end of the 16th century, had already invented a system; whereas Ray, who belonged to the 17th, was the first zoologist who formed a methodical arrangement of animals. It might thus be supposed that the examination of plants is easier, while that of minerals is more difficult, than the study of zoology; but the cause of the preference given to the vegetable economy seems to be connected with the value of herbs as articles of the Materia Medica, while the animal kingdom attracted more attention than the mineral, as exciting greater curiosity, and tending more directly to supply the most urgent wants of man. However this may be, it is certain, that in the 17th century the botanists greatly exceeded the zoologists in number. One of the most remarkable of the latter was the subject of the present notice, who, although merely a compiler, and not possessed of much judgment or taste, continued to be a popular author on natural history until his works were superseded by those of Linnaeus.