LINNEAN SOCIETY OF LONDON. H 



Sir John Richardson's ' Fauna Boreali- Americana,' illustrating the 

 Birds ; the zoological portion of Murray's ' EncyclopaBdia of G-eo- 

 graphy ;' ' Elements of Conchology, for the use of Students and 

 Travellers ;' and five parts of a work entitled ' Ornithological 

 Drawings : Series 1, Birds of Brazil.' In 1828 Mr, Swainson 

 passed several weeks in Paris, busied in studying the collections 

 of the French Museum, and adding to his large collection of 

 natural-history drawings. In 1835 he was left a widower with 

 five children ; and marrying again some years afterwards, he de- 

 termined on emigrating, with his family, to New Zealand, on the 

 climate of which, principally with reference to its sanative cha- 

 racter, he published a Httle work in 1840. In that year he 

 embarked on board a vessel, from the unseaworthiness of which he 

 unfortunately lost a large portion of his collections ; while, on his 

 arrival in New Zealand, he soon found that he had been misled 

 by exaggerated representations. He did not, however, suffer 

 himself to be dejected by these losses and disappointments. From 

 Rio de Janeiro, at which the vessel had touched to refit, he had 

 brought with him numerous vegetable productions, which he 

 thought would be suitable to the climate of New Zealand, and he 

 set himself energetically to work to establish himself in his new 

 abode. Of his pursuits as regards natural history during this 

 period few traces have reached England, although it cannot be 

 doubted that here, as elsewhere, a large portion of his attention 

 must have been devoted to his favourite pursuit. We only know 

 that he had his full share of those losses and privations which 

 usually fall to tlie lot of the earlier settlers in a new colony, aggra- 

 vated by the storms and earthquakes to which New Zealand ap- 

 pears to be peculiarly subject. In 1851 he visited Sydney ; and in 

 1853, he was engaged, under the authority of the governments of 

 Van Diemen's Land and Victoria, in an examination of the tim- 

 ber-trees of those colonies. Soon afterwards he returned to his 

 residence at Fern Grove, River Hutt, New Zealand, where he died, 

 it is supposed of an apoplectic seizure, after a week or ten days' 

 illness, on the 7th of December last, in the 67th year of his age. 

 His entry into the Linnean Society dates from 1816, and into 

 the Royal Society from 1820 ; and he was also an Honorary or 

 Corresponding Member of nimierous scientific societies both in 

 Europe and America. Of his five children by his first wife, four 

 sons survive him ; and of these, two are settled in New Zealand. 

 By his second wife he had three children, all daughters, who, with 

 their mother, also survive him. In addition to tlie extensive series 



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