55 2 
Notes. 
determined to devote his life and his fortune to travel and scientific 
pursuits. Beginning with ornithology and entomology, he subse- 
quently confined his attention to botany, and a few years after coming 
of age undertook a voyage to Iceland, where he made large collections 
with notes and observations. These were totally lost through the 
rapid destruction by fire, in mid ocean, of the ship in which he was 
making the return voyage to England. His life and those of the 
crew were saved through the fortuitous arrival of a vessel that should 
have left Iceland before them, but which had been providentially 
detained. On his return, he printed for private distribution his 
‘ Journal of a Tour in Iceland,’ which was shortly afterwards published 
in two volumes. This secured his election as a Fellow of the Royal 
Society at the early age of twenty-seven. Having been frustrated in 
his intention to visit Ceylon (for which he had completed his outfit) 
through disturbances in the island, and from going to Brazil or South 
Africa by the war with France, he turned his attention to Scotland, 
where he made three extended botanical tours, travelling in the 
Highlands on foot, on horseback, or by boat, as far as the Orkneys 
and Skye. He also spent nine months botanizing in France, Switzer- 
land, and the North of Italy. In the intervals he devoted himself 
to the study of Cryptogamic plants, chiefly Mosses and Hepaticae, 
upon which Orders he published works that established his reputation 
as a systematic botanist. 
Early in 1820, reduced circumstances requiring him to turn his 
botanical attainments to material account, he obtained, through the 
influence of his friend Sir Joseph Banks with George III, the chair 
of Regius Professor of Botany in this University. It was a bold 
venture for him to undertake so responsible an office, for he had 
never lectured, or even attended a course of lectures ; and in Glasgow, 
as in all other Universities in the kingdom, the botanical chair was, 
and had always been, held by a graduate in medicine. Owing to 
these disqualifications his appointment was naturally unfavourably 
viewed by the medical faculty of the University. But he had resources 
that enabled him to overcome all obstacles : familiarity with his 
subject, devotion to its study, energy, eloquence, a commanding 
presence with urbanity of manners, and above all the art of making 
the student love the science he taught. Success attended the delivery 
of his first course, hastily as it had to be prepared, as was proved 
by his students presenting him, at the close of the course, with 
