528 



Scotica,' with critical notes and observations. Although this Paper, 

 like most of those read before the Society, was not intended for pub- 

 lication, it led to the communication of his specimens and observa- 

 tions to Dr. Withering, who was then engaged in the preparation of 

 the second edition of his ' Arrangement of British Plants,' and laid 

 the foundation of a warm and intimate friendship between them. In 

 1 795, soon after the embodiment of the Fifeshire Regiment of Fen- 

 cible Infantry, he obtained in it the double commission of Ensign 

 and Assistant-surgeon, and proceeded with it to the North of Ireland, 

 in various parts of which he was stationed until the summer of 1 798, 

 when he was detached to England on recruiting service. Fortu- 

 nately for himself and for science, this service enabled him to pass 

 several months, during this and the succeeding year, in London, 

 where he availed himself to the utmost of the library and collections 

 of Sir Joseph Banks, from whom his already established botanical 

 reputation obtained for him a cordial reception. In 1799 he re- 

 turned to his regimental duties in Ireland, from which he was finally 

 recalled, in December of the following year, by a letter from Sir 

 Joseph Banks, proposing for his acceptance the post of Naturalist 

 in the Expedition for surveying the coasts of New Holland, then 

 fitting out under the command of Captain Flinders. Within two 

 days of the receipt of this letter, which placed within his reach the 

 so-much coveted opportunity of devoting himself entirely to his 

 favourite pursuit, he quitted the regiment and the military service ; 

 and in the summer of 1801 he embarked at Portsmouth, full of 

 ardour and confident of success. His absence from England lasted 

 more than four years, during which the southern, eastern, and 

 northern coasts of New Holland, and the southern part of Van Die- 

 men's Land, were thoroughly explored. In the month of October 

 1805 he arrived in Liverpool with a collection of dried plants 

 amounting to nearly 4000 species, a large proportion of which were 

 not only new to science, but exhibited new and extraordinary com- 

 binations of character and habit, Immediately on his arrival in 

 England, he was appointed Librarian of the Linnean Society, of 

 which he had been elected an Associate in 1 798. During his vovage 

 he had been indefatigable in describing with the minutest accuracy 

 the whole of the materials which he had collected, and in the accu- 

 mulation of a vast store of facts and observations in relation to their 



