PLANS, SEKIOUS AND OTHEE 163 



am, and see my way clearly before me till we return, after 

 which no foresight can tell what will become of me. I can 

 always fall back on the service as a livelihood. I shall 

 never regret having joined this expedition. We must, along 

 with Captain Boss, fail completely so as never to try again, 

 or succeed. No future Botanist will probably ever visit 

 the countries whither I am going, and that is a great 

 attraction. 



For a time, however, in 1841, his plans were sorely shaken 

 by the barrenness of the first Antarctic cruise and the shortness 

 of the stay in Tasmania, which seemed fatal to his project of 

 writing a Flora of the island. The rest of the cruise threatened 

 to waste two good years of a botanist's time. At this juncture 

 his Tasmanian friends conceived the plan that he should be 

 invalided and left in Tasmania, where he could continue his 

 botanical work. His health had suffered, in sober fact, from 

 brooding over his brother's death and the other bad news from 

 home. His friend Eonald Gunn, a botanist himself and 

 officially private secretary to Sir John Franklin, suggested, 

 in the spirit of Midshipman Easy, that he should work up a 

 cough and hoarseness, symptoms of impending consumption, 

 for the benefit of that keen-eyed disciplinarian, Captain Eoss. 

 He pointed out the obvious drawbacks to going so far as to 

 quit the service, and the burden it would be on his father if 

 Hooker could not live on his half pay while publishing his 

 collections ; but he was ready and able to help him in fifty 

 ways in taking this short cut to botanical fame. 



Happily the plan was dropped on reflection ; the considera- 

 tions contra were very strong, and there was the further chance 

 that as he recovered his scientific holiday might be % cut short 

 by an order to join some other vessel. Moreover, Sir William's 

 next letter urged him not to leave the service till he was fairly 

 home and could see at least what could be done about publish- 

 ing the collections, and though this only reached him later, it 

 confirmed his new resolutions to go on with the expedition 

 which he could not honourably leave. His gleanings in less 

 abundant fields were richer in scientific results than the harvest 

 he looked for as a collector. 



