THE LIFE OF THE AUTHOR.

An ornate decorative initial 'J' with floral and foliate motifs.

Jacob Dirkz was born in the village of Swammerdamme, situated between Leiden and Woerden, on the Rhine in Holland. When he later made his living in Amsterdam as a wood merchant, he was named after his birthplace. While he lived in Amsterdam, a son was born to him there on the last day of January 1606, who was named Jan Jacobz Swammerdam. He kept an apothecary shop in that city. And, on that occasion, being a special lover of things produced by Nature, and at the same time a great connoisseur of the same, he acquired over fifty years, with constant diligence, a very rich collection of these treasures. He spared neither effort nor cost to gather from all sides everything that pertained to the knowledge of these things. In his house was seen a complete collection of animals, small creatures, plants, and minerals. Everything was neatly arranged here, nothing in disorder or heaped up. But above all, the adornment consisted in the fact that the rarest things from the East and West Indies were gathered there, especially the most exquisite porcelain. Citizen and stranger, to whom it was permitted to view this, stood amazed by it. Indeed, many princes, traveling through our Fatherland, were lured to view it: among whom there have been some who made an offer to buy it all for themselves, since they were taken by the beauty of this cabinet. But no one could obtain it: because the owner wanted no less than sixty thousand guilders for it; yet, after the man's death, sold publicly at auction, it could barely fetch ten thousand guilders.

From this father, and Barentje Corver, daughter of Jan Jansz Corver, as mother, was born Jan Swammerdam, on the twelfth of February of the year 1637 after Christ's birth. Who later became the very famous author of this excellent book.

His father intended to prepare him to be a clergyman, and gave the child a teacher who could teach him the foundations of the Latin and Greek languages, so that he might better understand the Holy Scriptures: but he, considering the weight of this office and earnestly examining his own mind, decided that he would be incapable of this burden. And he made his father understand this so well that the latter believed it, and also allowed his son to make his work of Medicine. While he now had his son in his house, giving himself to this, he used him to clean and arrange the things of his cabinet. Through which this one also, from a young age, began to pay attention with all diligence to the things produced by Nature. Immediately he fell to the diligent observing, capturing, buying, exchanging for others, increasing, and collecting for himself. He arranged his own treasures, compared them with the writings of the best authors, and arranged everything under certain headings. Having grown somewhat older, he attended most diligently to all that concerned Anatomy and Surgery, even then already aiming for the highest. At those times he spent day and night to investigate, to capture,