240 



WANDERINGS IN 



TniKD After this pitiful stretch of power, and bad comphment 



Journey. 



to the other officers of the customs, who had been 



satisfied with the vahiation, this man had the folly to take 

 me aside, and after assm'ing me that he had a great regard 

 for the arts and sciences, he lamented that conscience 

 obliged him to do what he had done, and he wished he 

 had been fifty miles from Liverpool at the time that it fell 

 to his lot to detain the collection. Had he looked in my 

 face as he said this, he would have seen no marks of 

 credulity there. 



I now returned to the Custom-house, and after express- 

 ing my opinion of the officer's conduct at the depot, I 

 pulled a bunch of keys (which belonged to the detained 

 boxes) out of my pocket, laid them on the table, took 

 my leave of the gentlemen present, and soon after set off 

 for Yorkshire. 



I saved nothing from the grasp of the stranger officer, 

 but a pair of live Malay fowls, which a gentleman in 

 George-town had made me a present of. I had collected 

 in the forest several eggs of curious birds, in hopes of 

 introducing the breed into England, and had taken great 

 pains in doing them over with gum arabic, and in packing 

 them in charcoal, according to a receipt I had seen in the 

 gazette, from the " Edinburgh Philosophical Journal." 

 But these were detained in the depot, instead of being 

 placed under a hen ; which utterly ruined all my hopes 

 of rearing a new species of birds in England. Titled 



