268 JDr. Hooker on American Botany, 



one of the yards, and he was senseless when carried on shore t 

 he did not recover till some hours after, when he found him- 

 self extended before a fire, with more than fifty persons stand- 

 ing around him. His first idea, when his recollection re- 

 turned, was to inquire for his collections. Hf> was informed 

 that the packages which contained his own effects had been 

 Jyine; on deck, whence they were washed by the violence of 

 the waves ; but that those chests which had been lodged in 

 the hold had been taken out safely. This intelligence con- 

 soled him. Notwithstanding the wretched state of his health, 

 Michaux was compelled to remain six weeks at Egmond, and 

 to work day and night. His plants having got wetted by the 

 saltwater, he was obliged to immerse them all in fresh water, 

 and one after another, to dry them between new papers.'' 



On his return to his native country, Michaux employed 

 himself in preparing his //?5/o/-i/ o/'Oa/ts, a work which re- 

 flects the highesj credit upon its author ; not only because of 

 the number of new species which are there made known to 

 us, but also on account of the important uses to which the 

 timber of the different kinds may be applied. An appoint- 

 ment to explore other countries* prevented him from pub- 

 lishing himself any of his various new and important discov- 

 eries. His History of the Oaks was indeed printed, but the 

 plates were not all ready for the press before his departure 

 from Europe. It was edited in 1801. But that work which 

 more immediately concerns our present subject, and which 

 was compiled from the materials that he collected during his 

 travels in North America, is his Flora Borealis Americana, 

 sistens Characteres Playitarum quas in America Septentrionali 

 collegit et delexit Andreas Michaux. This appeartd in 1803, 

 ('he very year of Michaux's death,) in two volumes octavo, 

 with fift}-one neat plates in outlines. The ano'jymous edi- 

 tor, and indeed he may justly be considered the author, was 

 the eminent Claude Louis Richard, late professor of botany 

 at the School of Medicine in Paris, and unquestionably one 



* He embarked in the ill-conducted expedition under Captain Baudin ; 

 but like many others of the officers, when the vessel arrived at the Isle 

 of France, he refused to proceed further, and thinking' that Madagascar 

 presented a g-lorious field to the naturalist, he qtiitted the expedition ; 

 keeping his motives a secret till the moment of the sliip's departure. 

 Landing on the feast coast of that island, he resolved to prepare a garden 

 for the reception of his plants in the vicinity of Tamatada ; but here he 

 was seized with a fever, the consequence of the climate, aided by over- 

 exertion, and of which he died in 1803. 



