MEMOIR OF DRURY. 41 



and from several little circumstances in them, I can- 

 not help concluding that you are hastening to become 

 a Tar, and I will be hanged if you have not even 

 kept the captain's journal; else for what purpose need 

 you have wrote at the top of the letter, Isles de Los, 

 Lat. 9. 36 N., Wind S. W., instead of the date of 

 the year, &c. What was it to me, think you, where 

 those isles were situated, or whether the wind blew 

 north or south, that you must needs tell me those 

 circumstances before every thing else? I wanted 

 to hear of your health, and to that end with eager- 

 ness read first that letter and afterwards the en- 

 closed, and behold, to my greatest disappointment, 

 not a single word on that head, and except one 

 passage, of your having got about fifty curious in- 

 sects (which, by the bye, you don't say were large or 

 small), I might as well have received a letter from 

 some dull man of fortune on business. Indeed I 

 wanted to know something about the country, your 

 voyage, entertainment on board, and several other 

 matters, but as you have amply superseded that by 

 telling me you have only a few hours to write to 

 your friends, I readily excuse the omission of a Tar ; 

 in which light I shall certainly in future consider 

 you if you don't write more in the character of a 

 philosopher and a man of letters. You will make 

 a fine F. R. S. truly, to stuff your letters with the 

 variations of the wind, the needle, latitudes, &c. 

 when you should be describing some of Nature's 

 beauties out of the three kingdoms. In fine, there- 

 fore, " be a good boy, and do so no more " Now to 



