Sargent.] " [Oct. 19, 



New World again. His salary had not been paid for seven j-earsjiis per- 

 sonal resources were exhausted, and the government was unwilling or 

 unable to assist him. 



Baudin was about to sail for New Holland on his voyage of discovery, 

 and Michaux was given the opportunity of accompanying him as natu- 

 ralist. He finally accepted this otier, somewhat unwillingly, for his 

 thoughts and his longings were all directed towards America, and only on 

 condition that he might leave the vessel at the Isle of France, should cir- 

 cumstances seem to make it desirable for him to do so. Baudin sailed 

 on the 18lh of October, 1800, and touched at Teneriffe, where Michaux 

 was able to make valuable botanical collections, and reached the Isle 

 of France on the 19th of February, the following year. Here after a 

 stay of six months, in which Michaux made his first acquaintance with 

 the vegetation of the real tropics, he left the party for the purpose of 

 exploring the island of Madagascar, which seemed to ofler a more useful 

 field than New Holland for his labors. 



He landed on the east coast, and at once set about laying out a garden in 

 which he hoped to establish, provisionally, the plants he intended to bring 

 back from his journeys in the interior. Impatient of the delays caused by 

 the indolence of the natives he had employed to prepare the ground, 

 Michaux, in spite of the warnings of persons familiar with the danger of 

 exposure and overexertion under a tropical sun, insisted upon working 

 himself day after day. He was soon prostrated with fever, but his vigor- 

 ous constitution and indomitable will enabled him to resist the attack, and 

 his health being partially restored ai the end of four months he was ready 

 to start for the mountains. His preparations were all made, but on the 

 eve of his departure, late in November, 1803, he was attacked again with 

 fever, and died suddenly. 



Andre Michaux was only fifty-six years old, still in the prime of life 

 and possessed of all his powers, when his useful career was thus suddenly 

 brought to an end. Personally little is known of Michaux beyond what 

 may be learned from the perusal of his Journal. No portrait of him is 

 now known to exist.* He is said to have possessed a frank though some- 

 what taciturn nature, a not uncommon character in men who have passed 

 their lives in solitary wanderings or who have been long exposed to the 

 hardships and the dangers of the wilderness. His tastes were simple, and 

 the independence of his character was only equaled by his modesty and un- 

 ostentatious kindness to all persons with whom his wanderings brought 

 him in contact. 



Michaux's cultivation and literary ability, judged by his Journal, were 

 not great ; and his reputation as an author is due to the fact that his name 

 was printed upon the title page of the classical " Flora Boreali- Americana^" 

 which Richard drew up largely from the plants collected by Michaux in 



* According to Deleuze, the administration of the Miiseum voted in 1S04 to place a bust 

 of Mielmux in the garden in recognition of his services to natural science. It does not 

 appear, however, that it was ever made ; at least the botanists of the Museum have 

 now no recollection of it, and I have been unable to find any trace of this or of any 

 other portrait of Andre Michaux. 



