PREFACE. xw 
St. Bartholomew's, from which I returned in the au- 
tumn of 1811 in a perfect state of recovered health. 
The vessel in which I returned landed at the town of 
Wiscasset in the province of Main, This being a coun- 
try I had never visited before, I examined its vegetation 
with all possible attention ; and although the season was 
too far advanced for making any new discoveries, I 
gained considerable information respecting the geogra- 
phy of plants, a point I always considered highly in- 
teresting to the science. During my journey towards 
New York, I had an opportunity of visiting Professor 
Peck of Cambridge College near Boston, and seeing his Ț 
highly interesting collection of plants, collected on a 
tour to the alpine regions of the White Hills of New - 
Hampshire. , As the season was too far advanced when 
Iwas in that country to suffer me to think of ascending 
those mountains, this collection. was highly gratifying 
to me. 
; On soy tur 'to New York, ‘I found things in a situ- _ 
ation very unfavourable to the publication of scientific 
war with Great Britain. I therefore determined to take _ 
all my materials to England, where I conceived 1 
should not only have the advantage of consulting the 
most celebrated collections and libraries, but also meet 
. with that encouragement and support so necessary to 
works of science, and so generally bestowed upon them 
These expectations I found amply realized on my ar- 
riv lin London, I had very soon the pleasure of form- 
ing a circle of acquaintance among those attached to the 
science of Botany, by whom I was gradually introduced 
