THE OSPREY. 



121 



General) precedins" "F. R. S." (Fellow of the 

 Royal Society). He flourished it in the face of 

 those whom he considered his juniors in service. 

 For example, in a controversy with N. A. Vigors, 

 many years after his resignation, (1831) in the 

 Mag-azine of Natural History (iv, 484), he recalls 

 that that g-entleman "was, or is, in the arm^ ; 

 consequently he knows, or should know, that he 

 of whom he writes is his superior officer, and 

 that in 'camps and courts' he must g'ive him 

 place"! Swainson was more appreciative of the 

 joys of peace than of war, however, in most 

 respects and only was called upon to appU' his 

 knowledg-e of commissariat affairs in a small 

 wa3' to an expedition which he contemplated for 

 collecting- objects of natural history. He had 

 now ample leisure on his hands and a sufficient 

 competence for a bachelor. Besides his half 

 pav he had an allowance of about a thousand 

 dollars a 3'ear from his father. He was at 

 liberty therefore to g^o where he willed and he 

 had the means to gratify his wishes in modera- 

 tion. He had become unfitted to enjoy the 

 usual social emploj'ments of an English gen- 

 tleman. He says: "After living- so long upon 

 the Continent, and accustomed to the unsettled 

 life of the soldier, I was struck b^' what I 

 thought the artificial habits and the luxurj- of 

 Eng-lish society. I sighed for niy Sicilian cot- 

 tage; I longed again to ramble over mountains 

 clothed with luxurious plants —to sketch delight- 

 ful scener3' — to rise with the sun, g-allop on the 

 sands, climb precipices, and swim in the sea. 

 In place of this, I had to join dinner parties, 

 drink wines I detested, ride in carriages, dance 

 at balls, and do a hundred other things for 

 which I had neither health nor inclination. 

 Domestic society I truh' enjoyed; but that was 

 not sufficient to keep me at home. I had, there- 

 fore, no sooner returned to England than I 

 began lav'ing plans for quitting- it. Having 

 been delig'hted with reading Ee Vaillant's 

 travels, when a boy, and subsequently' perusing 

 those of Mr. Barrow, I fixed upon Southern 

 Africa as the best field for zoolog-ical investiga- 

 tion. I therefore began reading- books, and filled 

 a volume with extracts of every thing about the 

 Cape. But this project was diverted b^- a sin- 

 gular incident. Happening to spend an evening- 

 with Mr. Lambert, the celebrated botanist, he 

 told me he had just had a letter from a friend of 

 his, who had been many j'ears travelling at the 

 Cape, and had brought with him a collection 

 which filled two wagons! This friend was no 

 other than Dr. Burchell. I heard the news with 

 disma\'; for what, thought I, can be now left in 

 South Africa, more than the gleaning of a 

 harvest already reaped? A little consideration 

 might have showed me the absurdity' of this 

 opinion; but as I could not submit to follow in 

 the wake of another, I at once determined to 

 relinquish the Cape and choose some other 

 quarter yet untrod b^' the naturalist. Tliis 

 choice was soon made." 



VISIT TO BRAZIL. 



After considering various projects, Swainson 

 resolved to go on a collecting trip to South 

 America. "About this time, the jealous^' of the 



Portug^uese government relaxed, and they opened 

 Brazil to European researches. Mr. [Henrj'] 

 Koster had just jjublished [1816] his travels [in 

 Brazil]; he gave [Swainson] such a picture of 

 the zoological riches of the country- he had just 

 quitted, that [Swainson] resolved to accompany 

 him on his second journey; and [the two] left 

 England together on the 22d of November, 1816." 

 Swainson has given a brief account of his jour- 

 ney in the Edinburgh Philosophical Journal (i, 

 369-373. 1819), and another later in his autobio- 

 graphical sketch, but in so vague a manner that 

 it is not clear from either one what his exact 

 route was: combining and interpreting the two 

 versions, the following is as near the facts as 

 we can get. 



Swainson, with Koster, "landed about the end 

 of December, 1816, at Recife, in the province of 

 Pernambuco, 8 degrees south of the line." 

 While here he was witness to one of the peri- 

 odical disturbances which afflict South American 

 states — "the memorable revolt of the 6th of 

 March, 1817," — and this delayed his start for the 

 interior. "On the restoration of tranquility'," 

 in Jvme 1817, he "quitted Pernambuco with "a 

 small train" (a guide and three Indians) for "the 

 great river St. Francisco" or Silo Francisco of 

 the Portuguese Brazilians; he "setoff overland" 

 for the river. He found that "the face and pro- 

 ductions of the inland parts differ most essen- 

 tialU' from those of the coast. Water in these 

 dreary tracts is at all times scarce, and the ex- 

 cessive drought that had prevailed frequently 

 exposed [the part^-] to great privations and 

 even danger." He notes: "while travelling the 

 Sciicui, or interior of Pernambuco. we were con- 

 strained to drink difc/i water; hundreds of cattle 

 perished; whole villages migrated to the sea 

 coast; and we often were obliged to pick the 

 maggots out of our dried meat before it could be 

 converted into soup." At length, "in the be- 

 ginning of August," he and his party "reached 

 the village of Penedu" on the Rio Sao Fran- 

 cisco. He resolved to travel no longer overland. 

 "The droug-lit in the interior rendered it impos- 

 sible to proceed by that route to St. Salvador" 

 (Sao Salvador de Bahia) or, as generalh- known, 

 Bahia and he "accordingh' embarked for the 

 place in a canoe, and arrived in eight da3's. " (So 

 he sa3-s. We are practically told that he descend- 

 ed the river Sao Francisco and thence made 

 a vo3'age of several hundreds of miles in open sea 

 in what he calls a canoe.) Elsewhere (Birds, i, 

 260), he sa3's that nearh' a 3-ear was spent in 

 the province of Pernambuco alone and he sub- 

 sequenth- traversed overland to Bahia. At 

 Bahia he "found the two Prussian naturalists, 

 Messi-s. Sellow and Freveries, who had come 

 overland from Rio de Janeiro, with the Prince 

 Nieuwied, and had remained in the cit3- from 

 ill health, and also to arrange their collec- 

 tions." 



Swainson soon left them, and "made nearly a 

 complete tour of the bay [Bahia], and again set 

 out for the .SV/Ycm, where, savs he, "I continued, 

 varying- m3' residence, until the month of March 

 following, having in this space made immense 

 collections in every branch of natural history, 

 particularlv in the ornitholog3' of the interior, 

 which dift"ers both in species and novelt3- from 



