115 



Anno Domini 1629, Julii 13.' And a right pleasant description of 

 the journey is given. The ten companions, we are told, were Jonas 

 Styles, William Broad, John Buggs, Leonard Buckner, Job Weale, 

 Robert Larking, Thomas Wallis, two Edward Brownes (one of whom 

 was servant to William Broad), and Johnson himself; who tells us 

 that for some few years past it had been the truly laudable custom for 

 certain lovers of Botany to go out of town two or three times a year 

 for the purpose of collecting plants ; and that early on the morning of 

 the 13th of July, 1629, the above-named persons met at St. Paul's 

 Cathedral, whence they went down to the river side, and entered two 

 boats in order to proceed to Gravesend. Scarcely, however, had they 

 left the shore, when 



"Eripiunl subito nubes ccelumq. diemq. 

 Nostrorum ex oculis : ponto nox incubat atra. 

 Intonuere Poli, et crebris micat ignibus aether : 

 Preesenteniq. nobis intentant omnia mortem."* 



This tempest so terrified Buckner, Buggs, Weale, and Larking, that 

 they put in at Greenwich, there to refresh themselves after their fright. 

 " But we," says the more heroic Johnson, " without delay proceeded 

 onward to Gravesend, whence, after breakfast, having left a letter for 

 our absent friends, in order to let them know where we intended to 

 pass the night, we took the accustomed route to Rochester, and found 

 the following plants." Here follows a list of upwards of a hundred ; 

 none of them rare. 



On reaching Rochester they put up at the sign of the Bull, where 

 they were shortly joined by the friends they had left at Greenwich, 

 who, the thunder and rain having ceased, had again committed them- 

 selves to the mercy of the waves; but the tide failing them, they left 

 their boat at Erith, and walked to Gravesend, where they received the 

 epistle left by the party who had preceded them ; and mounting some 

 horses rode on to Rochester, where they all joyfully supped together 

 after the fatigues of the day. 



* Virgil, iEn. i. 92 : thus Englished by Dryden : 

 " Sable night involves the skies ; 



And heaven itself is ravished from their eyes. 

 Loud peals of thunder from the poles ensue, 

 Then flashing fires the transient light renew : 

 The face of things a frightful image bears, 

 And present death in various forms appears.'' 



