86 



HISTORY AND GEOGRAPHY OF TREES. PART I. 



father in a journey into East Florida, to explore the natural 

 productions of that country ; after which he settled on the river 

 St. John's, in that region, and finally returned, about the year 

 1771, to his father's residence. In 1773, at the request of Dr. 

 Fothergill of London, he embarked for Charleston, to examine 

 the natural productions of the Floridas and the western parts of 

 Carolina and Georgia, chiefly in the vegetable kingdom. In this 

 employment he was engaged nearly five years, and made nume- 

 rous contributions to the natural history of the country through 

 which he travelled. His collections and drawings were forwarded 

 to Dr. Fothergill ; and about the year 1790 Bartram published 

 an account of his ti'avels and discoveries in one volume 8vo, with 

 an account of the manners and customs of the Creeks, Chero- 

 kees, and Choctaws. This work soon acquired extensive popu- 

 larity, and is still frequently consulted. After his return from, 

 his travels, he devoted himself to science, and, in 1782, was 

 elected professor of botany in the university of Pennsylvania, 

 which post he declined in consequence of the state of his health. 

 In 1786 he was elected a member of the American Philosophical 

 Society, and was a member of several other learned societies in 

 Europe and America. We are indebted to him for the know- 

 ledge of many curious and beautiful plants peculiar to North 

 Am.erica, and for the most complete and correct table of Ame- 

 rican ornithology, before the work of Wilson, who was assisted 

 by him in the commencement of his American Ornithology, He 

 wrote an article on the natural history of a plant a few minutes 

 before his death, which happened suddenly, by the rupture of a 

 blood-vessel in the lungs, July 22. 1823, in the 85th year of his 

 age. {Ibid.) 



In Scotland, as we have seen (p. 48,), very little w^as done in 

 the way of introducing foreign trees and shrubs, during the 

 seventeenth century ; though the rudiments of this description 

 of improvement were laid about the end of it, by the establish- 

 ment of the Edinburgh Botanic Garden. In Nicolson's Scottish 

 Historical Library, published in 1702, this garden is stated to 

 have been brought to the highest degree of perfection by its 

 curator, Mr. James Sutherland, " whose extraordinary skill and 

 industry" are said to have greatly advanced this department of 

 natural history in Scotland. In Sibbald's Scotia Illustrata, 

 published in 1684, the Edinburgh Botanic Garden is said to 

 contain an arboretum, in which was " every kind of tree and 

 shrub, as well barren as fruit-bearing, the whole disposed in 

 fair. order" (p. 66.) ; and in Sibbald's Memoria Balfouriana, 

 published in 1699, this garden is said to be " the greatest orna- 

 ment of the city of Edinburgh." (p. 73.) The plants of this 

 garden have been twice removed to other situations (first in 

 1767, and again in 1822), and we believe there is now neither a 



