SKETCH OF THOMAS NTJTTALL. 693 



two volumes of about six hundred pages eacli and illustrated 

 with excellent woodcuts. In the course of his residence at Cam- 

 bridge he contributed papers to the various scientific periodicals 

 of the time, and issued a little book entitled An Introduction to 

 Systematic and Physiological Botany. 



About the beginning of 1833 Mr. Nuttall went to Philadelphia 

 with a collection of plants gathered by Captain Wyeth during a 

 journey overland to the Pacific Ocean. Captain Wyeth was soon 

 to start on a second expedition, to establish posts for the Colum- 

 bia Fishing and Trading Company, and Nuttall wished to accom- 

 pany him. Not being able to obtain a sufiiciently long leave of 

 absence from Cambridge, he resigned his position at the college 

 and spent the interval before the departure of the expedition in 

 Philadelphia studying the collection already referred to and his 

 own Arkansas plants. 



Mr. Nuttall and Mr. John K. Townsend, a young naturalist, 

 sent out jointly by the American Philosophical Society and the 

 Academy of Natural Sciences, joined Captain Wyeth's party at 

 Independence, Mo., from which place the start was made April 

 28, 1834. The details of the journey are given in Townsend's 

 Narrative of a Journey across the Rocky Mountains to the Co- 

 lumbia River, etc. On September 3d they came to the Columbia, 

 and, descending it, reached Fort Vancouver. Here the two natu- 

 ralists remained for the rest of the autumn to explore the sur- 

 rounding region. Then desiring to pass the winter months where 

 inclemency of the season would not interfere with their pursuits, 

 they took passage on a Boston brig for the Sandwich Islands, 

 where they arrived January 5, 1835. 



Here for the first time Mr. Nuttall enjoyed the beauties of a 

 tropical vegetation. He remained two months collecting plants 

 and sea shells on the several islands, and then, separating from his 

 companion, sailed for California. He spent a great part of the 

 spring and summer on the Pacific coast, then returned to the 

 Sandwich Islands, where he embarked on a Boston vessel to come 

 home by way of Cape Horn. It happened to be the vessel on 

 which Mr. Dana was serving his two years before the mast, and 

 the latter relates in his book that when rounding Cape Horn Nut- 

 tail's passion for flowers was aroused by the near view of land. 

 He entreated the captain to put him ashore, if only for a few 

 hours, that he might become acquainted with the vegetation of 

 this dreary spot, although the wind was blowing furiously and 

 the ship was surrounded with icebergs. When his persistent re- 

 quests were sternly refused he was much disappointed and dis- 

 pleased, being unable to comprehend such indifference to the 



cause of science. 



He arrived in October, 1835, and again took up his abode in 



