Alcide d'Orhigny. 49 



and encouragement. The authorities of the Museum voted him 

 an annual sum of 240/. for the expenses of his voyage, whereupon 

 Desfontaines, the Professor of Botany at the Museum, said to him, 

 " Do not start on so modest a sum, you will assuredly die of 

 hunger," and d'Orbigny set himself to work to obtain further 

 grants in aid of his object. Labonnefon tells us, " The Due de 

 Piivoli was living then at La-Ferte St. Aubin. Though his avarice 

 was notorious he could loosen his purse-strings when he foresaw 

 •a real advantage to science. D'Orbigny approached him and 

 pleaded his cause so well that the duke accorded him a subvention 

 of £120 a year up to 1830, and thanks to this the voyage became 

 practicable." On May 27 he left Paris to make his farewells to 

 his family at La Eochelle, reaching Brest from, there, where he 

 found he had to wait a month while the ship was being got ready. 

 He left France on board the corvette ' La Meuse,' sailing from 

 Brest on July 29. 1826, and he tells us that he was very sea-sick 

 for three days, and never suffered similarly again all his life. We 

 learn from a note in de Ferussac's Bulletin that he was accom- 

 panied by a friend, M. Trion, who was travelling also as a 

 naturalist.^ I have referred to their halt at Teneriffe on August 9, 

 where they stayed to take some necessary observations until the 

 18th {ante, p. 46). We are told that for some unexplained reason 

 they were not popular on board, and would appear to have suffered 

 some annoyances from the senior officers of the ship.^ They cast 

 anchor in the Bay of Pdo de Janeiro on September 24, 1826. 

 Here they were confronted with monetary difficulties, their letters 

 of credit being negotiable only at Buenos Ayres, and d'Orbigny 

 had to undertake the payment of 56/. to a German skipper on 

 arrival in the Argentine, and to take all risks of being captured 

 by corsairs on the way. They got away from Eio on October 14 

 and arrived at Montevideo in November. Here they got into 

 serious trouble. The place was besieged by Gauchos, and the 

 authorities were suffering from " nerves." D'Orbigny and Trion 

 had made some barometric observations at sea, for which they 

 were denounced by the intelligent German skipper ; they were 

 handed over to a company of negro soldiers under pretence of 

 being escorted to the commandant, and were cast into prison, "a 

 putrid hole full of malefactors and chained murderers." With 



' Bull, des Sci. Nat. et de Geol., xi. (1827) p. 173. We never hear anything more 

 of M. Trion. ^ ^ 



■-' Cf. the observations of Moseley on the relations between the scientific and 

 civilian staffs of the 'Challenger' Expedition. H. N. Moseley, "Notes of a 

 Naturalist on the ' Challenger,' " London, 1879, Introduction, p. vii. D'Orbigny 

 teUs us of the obstacles put in his way by the officers ; he says : — " Je regrette 

 d'avoir a dire que j'eus beaucoup a souffrir pendant toute cette travers^e du manque 

 absolu de precedes du commandant et de sou lieutenant qui ont pouss6 la mauvaise 

 volenti jusqu'a contraver continuellement mes explorations." The rest of the staff 

 seem to have behaved well. 



Feb. ?Ust, 1917 E 



