Banister, John

, mentioned by Mr. Ray in very high terms, as a man of talents in natural history, first made a voyage to the East Indies, about the close of the seventeenth century, and remained there some time but was afterwards fixed in Virginia. In that country he industriously sought for plants, described them, and himself drew the figures of the rare species he was also celebrated for his knowledge of insects and meditated writing the natural history of Virginia, for which, Mr. Ray observes that he was every way qualified. He sent to Ray. in 1680, “A catalogue of Plants observed by him in Virginia,” which was published in the second volume of Ray’s history, p, 1928. The world was deprived of much of the fruit of his labours, by his untimely death. Banister increased the martyrs to natural history. In one of his excursions in pursuit of his object, he fell from the rocks, and perished. His herbarium came into the | possession of Sir Hans Sloane, who thought it a considerable acquisition. Four papers by him, on subjects of natural history, peculiar to Virginia, are inserted in the Philosophical Transactions, No. 198, and 247. ¹