88 IXVIXCIBLE COURAGE. 



collecting together immense treasures of natural 

 objects arranging, preserving, describing, and 

 classifying them. Consulting rather his zeal in 

 the cause than his safety or strength, he subjected 

 himself to the severest trials, now walking over 

 the burning sands of the African deserts, exposed 

 to the scorching heat, or traversing rivers and tor- 

 rents upon the back of a negro, who was occasion- 

 ally up to his chin in water, or in defending 

 himself against tigers, wild boars, crocodiles, ser- 

 pents, and other savage animals, besides the many 

 noxious insects with which those deserts abound. 

 " I had," he says, " an amazing good state of health, 

 and this bore me up in the midst of so many perils 

 and toils, under which a great many would have 

 sunk. Neither the dangers I was exposed to from 

 wild beasts, nor the toils of coursing in the woods, 

 which are rendered inaccessible by thorns, nor the 

 sultry heats of the east wind that, obliged me every 

 instant to have recourse to the river waters in 

 order to quench my violent thirst none of all 

 these inconveniences deterred me nothing was 

 capable of cooling my courage." 



Some idea of the trials attendant upon his ex- 

 ploratory rambles may be formed when we learn 

 that his shoes grew tough like horn, scorched by 

 the burning sands ; then cracked, and at length fell 

 away to powder. The very reflection of the heat 



