NARRATIVE. 199 



without other covering than a Hnen dressing gown, to the cold 

 land breeze, in an open gallery, and returned like ice. This 

 circumstance hastened the attack which was hovering over liim, 

 and he was seized the next morning with the usual forerunners of 

 fever. Every medical aid was afforded ; the most unwearied and 

 thoughtful attention was paid him, night and day, by Captain 

 Findlay, and we flattered ourselves on the appearance of favourable 

 symptoms ; but his age and temperate habits, which we hoped 

 would have saved him, served but to lengthen the struggle ; they 

 were insufficient to counterbalance his extreme impatience at such 

 an interruption to his pursuits. His desire to recommence his 

 labours was so ardent that even when exhausted to a degree, that 

 we feared recollection had left him, he would call me to his bed 

 side, to know if I thought a week would enable him to be carried 

 about in a hammock, that he might determine tie few points left 

 undone. No entreaties, persuasions, or artifices, could dispossess 

 him of this one irritating anxiety, and he closed a fife of virtue 

 and honourable activity, on the tenth of January, 1824. 



The partial testimony of a wife wordd gain but little credit with 

 strangers. I do not, therefore, presume to make any comment 

 upon ]\Ir. Bowdich's talents or disposition ; neither is it for me 

 to expatiate upon the consequences of the untimely death of one 

 whom Science will unceasingly mourn, as one of the most favoured 

 of her children, and to whose memory she will not fail to pay that 

 tribute, which is never withheld from departed excellence. 



As for my own sorrows, were it possible for me to utter them, 

 I have, as a private individual, neither the right nor the inclination 

 to obtrude them upon general notice, conscious that the attempt 

 to make such feelings public must only cast suspicions upon their 

 sincerity. 



