40 MR. DRUMMOND’S COLLECTIONS. 
proper preservation of specimens a work 
of absolute impossibility. I am almost 
afraid that the accompanying collection, 
which I have taken the utmost: pains to dry 
sufficiently, may not reach you in good 
order. My recovery from cholera was very 
slow. When my appetite returned, I was 
nearly starved for want of food, the few 
individuals who remained alive being too 
much exhausted with anxiety and fatigue 
to offer to procure me any thing. I am 
now, thank God, nearly well again, though 
my face and legs continue much swollen, a 
symptom which was very violent when I 
first began to recover, and is gradually 
wearing off. As far as possible, I am en- 
deavouring to replace the specimens which 
were spoiled during my illness, and have 
just packed up the whole, consisting of 
about an hundred species of plants, and as 
many specimens of birds, consisting of 
about sixty species, some snakes, and se- 
veral land-shells. Two of the latter inha- 
bit the salt-marshes, but are not aquatic ; 
for when the ground becomes flooded, they 
take refuge on the tops of grasses and 
shrubs. Among the plants are several 
which I would particularly recommend as 
deserving of notice for their beauty: two 
are species of Coreopsis,! one with flowers 
twice as large as those of C. tinctoria, and 
extremely handsome. There is also a 
syngenious plant, allied to Rudbeckia (pro- 
bably the beautiful var. of Galardia bi- 
color, fig. at t. 3368, Bot. Mag.)—the 
blossoms are copper-coloured, and the 
whole rises to about a foot high, and covers 
a diameter of three or four feet: I may 
safely say, that I have seen more than a 
hundred flowers open on it at the same 
time. Also a fine procumbent Œnothera, 
much like C2. macrocarpa, (QE. Drum- 
mondi, Hooker in Bot. Mag. t. 3361,) and a 
charming Jzia, of which I send roots. The 
seeds of the other plants will, I hope, ar- 
rive in good order. I trust that my col- 
* Two fine species of the Genus, and probably the 
same as here alluded to, have flowered in the Botanic 
Garden of Glasgow, from seeds sent by Mr. Drum- 
— iis will soon be given in the Botanical Maga- 
lection of bird-skins from Louisiana has 
reached you safely. Some, which were in- 
jured by the too large size of the shot 
which I procured there, I only send, to 
prove what species inhabit the country. 
The want of my tent and the chief part of 
my ammunition, which I was obliged to 
leave at St. Louis, proves a serious incon- 
venience to me. To-morrow I intend mak- 
ing an attempt to reach Brazosia again, but 
the greater part of the journey is waist- 
deep in mud and water; thence I shall go 
to San Felipe, whither my baggage is al- 
ready sent, sixty miles beyond Brazosia. 
Above the latter place, the river is not na-- 
vigable for boats, so that my luggage must 
goin waggons. I feel anxious about my 
collections, which I leave here, to await a 
vessel going to New Orleans; but there is 
no help for it, and from the interior of the 
country it is still more difficult to obtain 
conveyances, the charge for freight being 
so enormous as to exceed the value of the 
collections. The cost from Brazosia to 
New Orleans is forty cents. per foot, and the 
amount of my passage and luggage hither 
was fifty dollars. Boarding averages six dol- 
lars a-week, and thatoftheroughestkind. It 
is, however, so long since my hope of be- 
ing able to realize any thing more than will 
cover my expenses has been dispelled, 
that I am not disappointed, and my only 
desire is to remunerate those who have 
contributed to my outfit, and by the collec- 
tions of Natural History specimens which I 
shall send home, to give a good general 
idea of the productions of this part of the 
world. Of the genera Pentstemon and 
Sabbatia (?), which are beautiful and nu- 
merous, I send many specimens and seeds; 
also of a lovely Rudbeckia, which is a 
great ornament to the prairies here. I 
could ask a thousand questions about my 
plants, for I am shut out from all informa- 
tion; though Pursh's American Flora is 
among my luggage, I can hardly get a sight 
of it. You may form an idea of the diffi- 
culties I have to encounter in this misera- 
ble country (more miserable, however, as 
to its inhabitants than in any other respect) 
when I tell you, that all the bird-skins I sent - 
