BIOGRAPHICAL NOTICE 
OF THE LATE ' 
CAPTAIN DUGALD CARMICHAEL, F. L. S. 
By the Rev. Coxix Surru, Minister of Inverary. 
[Ir was, I think, in the spring of 1820, when at the house of 
the late Sir Joseph Banks, that my friend, Mr. Brown, spoke 
to me of a gentleman of considerable acquirements having 
arrived from the Island of Tristan d' Acunha, with an exten- 
sive collection of its vegetable productions. My love for 
Cryptogamic Plants led me to inquire if these had constituted 
a part of his collections and studies, to which Mr. Brown 
replied in the affirmative, and added, that he had left no 
branch of the natural history of the island unexplored; as 
was fully exemplified in the account of the island which 
afterwards appeared in the 12th volume of the Transactions 
of the Linnzean Society. This was the first time I heard 
of Capt. Carmichael, for it was of him that Mr. Brown 
spoke; and I had then no opportunity of making his acquain- 
tance, as my professional duties required. me to proceed 
to Scotland, where, however, I had soon the opportunity 
of obtaining a personal knowledge of the subject of this 
memoir. He had just retired from active life, having taken a 
farm at Appin, upon the romantic coast of Argyleshire; a spot 
well suited to the researches of a naturalist. Already, in the 
few months he had spent there, Capt. Carmichael had ex- 
plored much of the country in the vicinity of his new 
residence, and he brought with him to Glasgow an interesting 
collection of the mosses of that district, with whose names 
and characters he soon made himself familiar. It was 
impossible not to be struck. with the varied knowledge 
and information possessed by Capt. Carmichael; for though 
in botany he took the greatest delight, yet with almost every 
subject, and especially such as bore any relation to his ex- 
tensive travels, his mind was richly stored. Distant and 
reserved at first, it was not till acquaintance had ripened into- 
friendship, that his conversational powers were fully wu 2 
VOL. II. 2 B 
