CoLENSo. — Manibus Parkinsonibus sacrum. 118 



man dwell with pleasure on the relation of his singular simplicity of 

 conduct, his sincere regard for truth, his ardent thh-st after knowledge, his 

 indefatigable industry to obtain it, and his generous disposition in freely 

 communicating with the most friendly participation to others, that informa- 

 tion which none but himself could have obtained. That this is more than 

 probable will appear, on comparing the different manner in which Sydney 

 and his associates passed their time in the most interesting situations. 

 While many others, for want of a more innocent curiosity or amusement, 

 were indulging themselves in sensual gratifications, — we find him gratifying 

 no other passion than that of a laudable curiosity, which enabled him 

 inoffensively to employ his time and escape those snares into which the 

 vicious appetites of some others betrayed them. It doth equal honour to 

 his ingenuousness and ingenuity, to find him protected by his own innocence, 

 securely exercising his pleasing art amidst a savage, ignorant, and hostile 

 people ; engaging their attention by the powers of his pencil, disarming 

 them of their native ferocity, and rendering them even serviceable to the 

 great end of the voyage in cheerfully furnishing him with the choicest 

 productions of the soil and climate, which neither force or stratagem might 

 otherwise have procured. 



"By such honest arts and mild demeanour he soon acquired the con- 

 fidence of the inhabitants of most places at which the voyagers went on 

 shore ; obtaining thus, as I am well-informed, with remarkable facility, the 

 knowledge of many words in various languages hitherto little, if at all, 

 known in Europe. 



"These paved the way also to his success in acquhing a choice and 



rare collection of curiosities, consisting of garments, domestic utensils, 



rural implements, instruments of war, uncommon shells, and other natural 



curiosities of considerable value — of so much value, indeed, as even to 



seduce men of reputed sense, fortune, and character, to attempt, by means 



unworthy of themselves, to deprive me of what, after the loss su.stained in 



the death of so deservhig a brother, one would think none ought to envy 



me the gain. 



******** 



" Of these curiosities, the shells alone Dr. John Fothergill (a common 

 friend of my late brother and Joseph Banks) had valued at £200 ; yet neither 

 the shells, nor anything else, hath Joseph Banks to this day returned me. 

 The reasons he gives for the detention are — that I have used him ill ; that 

 he hath given me a valuable consideration for them ; and, in short, that he 

 will keep them. Of this pretended valuable consideration I am now to 

 speak. On the readiness I showed to oblige Joseph Banks with such of the 

 shells as he might not have in his collection, Dr. Fothergill informed me 



