Linnaeus is sorry that Zacharias Strandberg and Johan Gottschalk Wallerius have got positions that Bäck has applied for and that Abraham Bäck has got nothing.
Linnaeus mentions that Bäck, who has been a successful doctor for ten years, could pay 14,000 dalers for the position of Court Physician, but he thinks the sum is too high. If Bäck negotiates with Nils Rosén von Rosenstein and increases the sum a little, Bäck will get something better.
The dissertation Specimen academicum de Taenia is printed, and Linnaeus has asked Gottfried Dubois to send Bäck a copy.
From Italy [Joseph von Rathgeb to Linnaeus, 6 December 1748{L0980}], Linnaeus has received a new species called Aldrowanda and Parus nidum suspendens. It is very nicely drawn, and Linnaeus would like to publish it to the the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences [Kungliga Svenska Vetenskapsakademien]. However, he cannot find anybody in the city who can make a plate of it.
Linnaeus wonders about Johan Frederik Gronovius, from whom Linnaeus has not heard anything. Linnaeus is afraid Gronovius has died of anger after having been dismissed.
Johann Georg Gmelin is about to get married, and François Boissier de La Croix Sauvages in Montpellier has just married. Bäck should be the next one.
Materia Medica will be ready as soon as Salvius can print it, and Bäck will have a copy. The index is now in the press. Linnaeus would be glad if serious practitioners could find use for the little work, which is primarily meant for Linnaeus’s students.
Linnaeus adds to his description of the tunnel in his previous letter. It does not go close to any walls, so there is no risk of damage to the superstructure. The vault is easy to see, and when you have got in, you do not have to touch anything. The tunnel is well preserved in all directions, towards the bishop’s residence, towards the church or towards the palace.
P. S. 1.Linnaeus reports that the Royal Chancellery [Kungliga Kanslikollegium] had issued a law forbidding printing abroad of works already published in Sweden. He is very much annoyed at this, and he thinks that the law is aimed at his work and nobody else’s.
P. S. 2.Linnaeus had remembered Ludvig Holberg’s prophecy about Swedish science [Linnaeus refers to Nicolai Klimii iter subterraneum, transl. to Swedish in 1746, Nicolai Klimii resa uti den underjordiska werlden], which was making such great progress.