EARLY YEARS 13 



next day, there was another barrow, and on the i8th a 

 third. He visited a distant relative, Mr. Bankes of 

 Kingston Lacy, and saw his pictures ; and Mr. Hum- 

 phrey Sturt, at Crichel, who kept several kinds of 

 animals in the park. On the 2ist there was another 

 barrow. By this time he is prepared to launch out into 

 conjectures as to their meaning and origin. Travelling 

 through Shaftesbury and Bath to Bristol, he proceeded 

 to Chepstow. Here, and in the neighbourhood, he revelled 

 for several days, alternately charmed with the country 

 and absorbed in botanizing. At Piercefield (" much im- 

 proved since I saw it last ") he visited a friend, Valentine 

 Morris. On the 26th he returned to Bristol, and had a 

 day's botanizing at Clifton. After this he visited Wells, 

 Glastonbury, Taunton, Bridgewater, Clevedon ; and 

 then stayed at Clifton a few days, with more botanizing 

 at St. Vincent's Rocks. On the way home to London 

 he stopped to look at Silbury Hill and the other strange 

 relics thereabouts, including the Grey Wethers, of which a 

 few stones yet remain visible from the highway. He 

 found " the people in that neighbourhood were breaking 

 great numbers of them, either to mend the roads or 

 build houses, which gave me an opportunity of examining 

 them and bringing away some pieces, which I found to 

 be of a very hard and fine-grained sandstone." 



Another excursion was taken this summer, in the com- 

 pany of two companions. They spent a week or two in 

 North Wales, mostly botanizing. William Hudson was 

 one of this party ; in all likelihood a very good comrade 

 for the occasion. His social merits were high, the out- 

 come of a tranquil but genial disposition. He had studied 

 with an apothecary, and practised v medicine. An ac- 

 quaintance with Benjamin Stillingfleet, together with an 

 ardent study of the Sloane Collections, made him a 

 botanist. He acquired a European fame by the publica- 

 tion of his Flora Anglica (London, 1762). 



