A little better than these is the work of the wizard Michael the Scot (1175?-1234?). Roger Bacon tells us that Michael in 1230 'appeared [at Oxford], bringing with him the works of Aristotle in natural history and mathematics, with wise expositors, so that the philosophy of Aristotle was magnified among the Latins'.[46] Scott produced his work _De animalibus_ about this date and he included in it the three great biological works of Aristotle, all rendered from an inferior Arabic version.[47] Albertus Magnus (1206-80) had not as yet a translation direct from the Greek to go upon for his great commentary on the _History of animals_, but he depended on Scott. The biological works of Aristotle were rendered into Latin direct from the Greek in the year 1260 probably by William of Moerbeke.[48] Such translations, appearing in the full scholastic age when everything was against direct observation, cannot be said to have fallen on a fertile ground. They presented an ordered account of nature and a good method of investigation, but those were gifts to a society that knew little of their real value.[49] [46] Roger Bacon, _Opus majus_, edited by J. H. Bridges, 3 vols., London, 1897-1900. Vol. iii, p. 66. [47] On the Aristotelian translations of Scott see A. H. Querfeld, _Michael Scottus und seine Schrift, De secretis naturae_, Leipzig, 1919; and C. H. Haskins, 'Michael Scot and Frederick II' in _Isis_, ii. 250, Brussels, 1922. [48] J. G. Schneider, _Aristotelis de animalibus historiae_, Leipzig, 1811, p. cxxvi. L. Dittmeyer, _Guilelmi Moerbekensis translatio commentationis Aristotelicae de generatione animalium_, Dillingen, 1915. L. Dittmeyer, _De animalibus historia_, Leipzig, 1907. [49] The subject of the Latin translations of Aristotle is traversed by A. and C. Jourdain, _Recherches critiques sur l'âge des traductions latines d'Aristote_, 2nd ed., Paris, 1843; M. Grabmann, _Forschungen uber die lateinischen Aristoteles Ubersetzungen des XIII. Jahrhunderts_, Münster i/W., 1916; and F. Wüstenfeld, _Die Ubersetzungen arabischer Werke in das Lateinische seit dem XI. Jahrhundert_, Göttingen, 1877.