of the latter for the "species maker," is an old story and Sharpe's position 

 in the debate was made clear. 



On July 29, 1 sailed from Southampton for Cape Town by the Union- 

 Castle liner Saxon, with a large proportion of the British Association, 

 including nearly the whole of the "official party." This body, the 

 existence of which gave occasion for great heartburnings, consisted of 

 the officers of the Association, with their families, and the specially 

 invited foreign guests. The members of the official party were given free 

 passes over all South African railways, unlimited for the term of our 

 stay, were entertained in private houses, thus eliminating all hotel 

 expenses, and, for the foreigners, the steamer fare from England to 

 South Africa and return was also paid. For the common, unofficial 

 herd, half fares on the railroads and reduced rates at the hotels were 

 provided; in some instances, as at Johannesburg, all the visitors were 

 privately entertained. 



The voyage, which lasted for seventeen days, was, in many respects, 

 different from any other that I ever made and, not least so, in the 

 character of the passenger list. Except for the return voyage, I have 

 never been in a ship that carried so many eminent men, though these 

 were not always the pleasantest of travelling companions. There were 

 but three Americans beside myself. Professors W. M. Davis, of Harvard; 

 Carhart, University of Michigan; and Douglas Campbell of Leland 

 Stanford. Ernest Brown, with whom I had long been associated in the 

 Philosophical Society, was an EngHshman, a Cambridge man and a 

 professor in Haverford College. Since that date, he has gone to Yale, 

 become a naturalised American and a member of the National Academy 

 of Sciences. George Darwin, professor of astronomy at Cambridge, was 

 the President of the British Association that year and Brown, who was 

 an intimate friend of his, acted as his assistant throughout the excursion. 

 There was one Frenchman, an ill-tempered personage, who was not 

 popular and often made himself ridiculous with loudly expressed 

 demands and pretensions. A few Germans and one Swede were the 

 only other foreigners that I knew of. 



On the second day out, I had a violent attack of ptomaine poisoning 

 and, when I landed at Madeira, I was still hardly able to walk and, as I 

 toiled painfully up the steps of the pier, an obvious German came for- 

 ward and very politely asked if I were Professor Scott. When I admitted 

 the fact, he said that he had been instructed by the Hohenlohe syndicate 

 to look out for me. He took me halfway up the mountain to a charming 

 little hotel, which had a wonderful outlook over the Bay of Funchal 



n 264 3 



