NAPOLEON'S TOMB 99 
more hackneyed spot than Richmond or Kensington 
Gardens. 
His fears were justified when he reached the tomb. 
It is situated at the head of this valley, guarded by a 
sentinel who duns you about the mighty dead, and gives you 
water that the Emperor drank ; on turning your heel upon 
him, numerous children assail you with flowers, Geraniums, 
that the Emperor was fond of. On turning into a pretty 
cottage to get some ale at 25. a bottle, the cork was no 
sooner drawn than out came the Emperor with it ; it was 
the Emperor this, that, and the other thing ; our hostess's 
daughter came in with the Emperor on her lips ; his ubiquity 
certainly astonished me. As a last resource I commenced 
gathering Lichens ; surely the hero of Marengo could have 
nothing to do with Lichens on a stone wall, when another 
disinterested stranger came to inform me that the Emperor 
had from it marked out the position of his tomb, and that 
the Emperor was fond of the wild plants I had in my hand. 
I fairly took to my heels, heartily wishing that for my own 
sake as well as for the good cause of humanity, the Emperor 
had had his wish of living and dying in some remote corner 
of Britain. 
The Cape was reached on March 17, and left on April 6, 
1840. There is little to note during this brief stay. Hooker's 
impressions of the Cape date from his second and longer visit. 
This time he collected, as has been said, some 300 species of 
Cape plants to study on the voyage. A long five weeks of 
sailing brought the ships to Kerguelen's Land, where Ross's 
prolonged magnetic observations kept them from May 12 
to July 20. 
Though this lodestone of Hooker's childish imaginations 
deserved all too well its other name of Desolation Island, 
its fascination for him was reinforced, as we have seen, by a 
still stronger spell, the charm of discoveries leading on to 
luminous generalisations. The letter to his father from 
Hobart (August 16, 1840) describing the place deserves fairly 
full quotation.^ 
^ The passages enclosed in square brackets are from the Journal. 
