CORRESPONDENCE WITH HIS FAMILY. 101 



mense extent of country is visible, and think myself very for- 

 tunate in having had weather clear enough to afford a. sight 

 of such distant objects so late in the year. On my return I 

 found all the family well. Your journey to Oxford, I hope, 

 has been of no disservice to you ; I think I heard at Fyfield 

 you were there. With best respects to yourself and all friends 

 with you, I remain, 



Your obliged and affect. 



SAM. BARKER. 



LETTER XLIIL 



TO SAMUEL BARKER. 



Seleburne, April 17, 1786. 



DEAR SIR, 



PARTLY thro' idleness and partly thro' infirmity, I have too 

 long neglected your late letter. My thanks are due for y r 

 curious account of the climate of Zarizyn * : and I feel myself 

 the more obliged, because you know I love to study climates. 

 Whether you translate or abridge Dr. Pallas I do not know, 

 but should be glad to see the remaining part of that year, if 

 the subject does not give you too much trouble. I believe all 

 fervid regions afford instances of undulating vapours, that at 

 a distance appear like water : Arabia I know does ; and the 

 phenomenon is finely alluded to in the Koran. In what 

 language does Pallas write ? 



The summer-like weather of last Friday fetched out Timothy. 

 There is something very forlorn and abject in that creature's 

 first appearance after a profound slumber of five months. 

 When a man first rouses himself from a deep sleep he does 

 not look very wise; but nothing can be more squalid and 

 stupid than our friend, when he first comes crawling out of 

 his hibernacula ; so that some farther lines of Dryden's ode 



* [This is to be found at pp. 641-646 of the third volume of the original 

 edition of Pallas's < Travels ' (Reise, u. s. w. St. Petersburg: 1776). A. N.] 

 VOL. II. M 



