Constantine Samuel Rafinesque. 123 



are given at some length. Doctor Asa Gray, who also 

 quotes them, does so with the remark that in them 

 Rafinesque &quot;draws a lively picture of the discomforts, 

 as well as the enjoyments of a travelling naturalist&quot;. 

 They certainly are both vivid and true to nature: 



&quot; During so many years of active and arduous explorations, I 

 have met of course all kinds of adventures, fares and treatment. 

 I have been welcomed under the hospitable roof of friends of knowl 

 edge and enterprise, else laughed at as a mad botanist by scornful 

 ignorance. Such a life of travels and exertions has its pleasures 

 and its pains, its sudden delights and deep joys mixed with dangers, 

 trials, difficulties and troubles. No one could better paint them 

 than myself, who has experienced them all. L,et the practical 

 botanist, who wishes like myself to be a pioneer of science, and to 

 increase the knowledge of plants, be fully prepared to meet dangers 

 of all sorts in the wild groves and mountains of America. The 

 mere fatigue of a pedestrian journey is nothing compared to the 

 gloom of solitary forests, when not a human being is met for many 

 miles, and if met he may be mistrusted; when the food and collec 

 tions must be carried in your pocket or knapsack from day to day ; 

 when the fare is not only scanty but sometimes worse ; when you 

 must live on corn bread and salt pork, be burned and steamed by 

 a hot sun at noon, or drenched by rain, even with an umbrella in 

 hand, as I always had. Musquitoes and flies will often annoy you 

 or suck your blood if you stop or leave a hurried step. Gnats dance 

 before the eyes, and often fall in unless you shut them ; insects 

 creep on you and into your ears. Ants crawl on you whenever 

 you rest on the ground, wasps will assail you like furies if you 

 touch their nests. But ticks, the worst of all, are unavoidable 

 whenever you go among bushes, and stick to you in crowds, filling 



