The most celebrated of Ray’s botanical publications is his ‘Synopsis Methodica Stirpium Britannicarum.’ Sir James Smith, in a memoir of Ray, in Rees’s Encyclopædia, declares that of all the systematical and practical Floras of any country, the second edition of Ray’s Synopsis is the most perfect. The same writer, in the Transactions of the Linnæan Society, vol. iv., says of this Synopsis, “he examined every plant recorded in his work, and even gathered most of them himself. He investigated their synonyms with consummate accuracy; and if the clearness and precision of other authors had equalled his, he would scarcely have committed an error.” Ray’s ‘Methodus Plantarum Nova,’ first published in 1682, has been superseded by other systems; but the accuracy of his observations, the precision of his language, and the clearness of his general views, tended greatly to the advancement of botanical science. His ‘Historia Plantarum,’ in three vols. folio, a vast compilation, including all the botanical knowledge of his day, is still in use, as a book of reference, by those who especially devote themselves to this study. The zoological works of Ray have had a more direct and permanent influence upon the advancement of natural history, than his botanical. Amongst his zoological productions, the best authorities are agreed that we ought to include the greater part of those edited by him as the posthumous works of his friend Willughby. They are conceived upon the same principle as his own History of Plants, and are arranged upon a nearly similar plan; whilst the style of each is undoubtedly the same. In the original division of their great subject, Ray had chosen the vegetable kingdom, and Willughby the animal; and Ray, therefore, may have felt himself compelled to forego some of his own proper claims, that he might raise a complete monument to the memory of his friend. The Ornithology appeared in 1676; the History of Fishes in 1686. Ray, however, prepared several very important zoological works, of his entire claims to which there can be no doubt. The chief of these are, ‘Synopsis methodica animalium quadrupedum et serpentini generis,’ 1693, which he published during his life; ‘Synopsis methodica avium,’ and ‘Synopsis methodica piscium,’ edited by Derham, and published in 1713; and ‘Historia insectorum,’ printed at the expense of the Royal Society, in 1710. “The peculiar character of the zoological works of Ray,” says Cuvier, “consists in clearer and more rigorous methods than those of any of his predecessors, and applied with more constancy and precision.” The divisions which he has introduced into the classes of quadrupeds and birds have been followed by the English naturalists, almost to our own day; and one finds very evident traces of his system of birds in Linnæus, in Brisson, in Buffon, and in all the authors who are occupied with this class of animals. The Ornithology of Salerne is little more