17423.] doctor colden. 307 



pleasure I received, in reading thy agreeable letter of December 

 22d, which I received yesterday. It put me in mind of what our 

 friend Collinson "wrote to me, last fall, and desired me to call 

 and see, for that I should find thee a man after my own heart. I 

 had before sent thee three letters, and had no answer, which 

 almost discouraged me from writing, yet resolved to write once 

 more. 



I am now as well in health as I have been for several years ; 

 and since my recovery, have been along our sea-coast, as I gave 

 thee an account of in my last letter, sent with the walnuts, which 

 I am glad are under thy son's care ; but am sorry that thee had 

 not received them directly, soon after their arrival at York, for I 

 had taken care to keep them in moderate moist vegetative condi- 

 tion until the day the sloop sailed with them ; and if they dry or 



cal pursuits, and the duties of his office of Surveyor-General. The spot which he 

 had selected for his retirement is entirely inland, and has nothing remarkably 

 pleasant in it. At the time he chose it for a residence, it was solitary, unculti- 

 vated, and the country around it absolutely a wilderness. It was, besides, a 

 frontier to the Indians, who were often in a state of hostility, and committed fre- 

 quent barbarities. 



In 1761, Dr. Coldex was appointed Lieutenant-Governor of New York; which 

 commission he held till near the time of his death ; which took place at his 

 country seat, on Long Island, on the 28th of September, 1776, in the 89th year 

 of his age. 



Notwithstanding his numerous and important public duties, Doctor Colden 

 was zealously devoted to the pursuits of Literature and Science ; and while he 

 maintained an extensive correspondence with the learned of the old world, he 

 was ever delighted to receive his scientific friends beneath his own hospitable 

 roof. In a letter from Doctor Garden to LiNNiEUS, dated Charleston, South 

 Carolina, March 15, 17o-3, that gentleman says, " When I came to New York, I 

 immediately inquired for Coldenhamia, the seat of that most eminent botanist, 

 Mr. Coldex. Here, by good fortune, I first met with John Bartram, returning 

 from the Blue Mountains, as they are called. How grateful was such a meeting 

 to me ! And how unusual in this part of the world ! What congratulations and 

 salutations passed between us ! How happy should I be to pass my life with men 

 so distinguished by genius, acuteness and liberality, as well as by eminent bota- 

 nical learning and experience ! Men, in whom the greatest knowledge and skill 

 are united to the most amiable candour 



Animce, quales ncque candidiores 



Terra tulit. 



"Whilst I was passing my time most delightfully with these gentlemen, they 

 were both so obliging as to show me your letters to them ; which has induced me, 

 sir, to take the liberty of writing to you, in order to begin a correspondence, for 

 which I have long wished, but never before found the means of beginning." 

 Rees's Ci/clopccdia ; and the Linncean Correspondence. 



