Letter 0832

Preston has yet to send Paterson’s things. He will do so as soon as a boat is headed for London. Preston writes about the number of physicians multiplying in Edinburgh and how it has gotten to the point that he needs Sloane’s encouragement just to remain amongst them. He informs Sloane that due to the great numbers, there is ‘much tangling amongst the physicians’. Preston was a physician and botanist who established a lengthy correspondence with Sloane, exchanging plants, seeds, books and information. His main interest was in botany, and was well-known by his contemporaries for his botanical knowledge (Anita Guerrini, Preston, Charles (16601711), Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, 2004 [http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/47084, accessed 1 June 2011]).