SOME NEW ZEALAND NATURALISTS.

Otago Witness, Issue 3312, 5 September 1917, Page 60

SOME NEW ZEALAND NATURALISTS.

I.—SIR JOSEPH BANKS, F.R.S. By Geo. M. Thomson, F.L.S. Nearly everybody in New Zealand has heard of Banks Peninsula, and all students of New Zealand botany have heard of Banks and Solander; Jnit beyond the fact that Banks accompanied Captain Cook on his first voyage to these islands, they know little about him. The same remark applies even more truly to many of those who first —after him—made known the natural history of New Zealand, arid therefore it may be of interest to readers of the Witness to get some information about the men to whom we are indebted for the first knowledge of the plants and animals of the country. I put the plants first, because knowledge of them mostly preceded that of the animals. The first name associated with the subject is also one of the most celebrated, and his life is full of interest to us here.

Sir Joseph Banks was born in London in February, 1743, his father belonging to a Lincolnshire family. It is characteristic of the English way of bringing up boys that he was handed over to the tender mercies of a public school at the tender age of nine, when he was sent to Harrow. Four years later he was transferred to Eton, 'then and now the most aristocratic school in England, where all his training was in classics. He was a boy of only 14 when he awoke to a knowledge of the wonders of Nature. One fine summer evening he had stayed bathing so long in the Thames that all his companions had gone. Walking back to school leisurely along a lane, the sides of which were clothed with flowers, he was so struck by their beauty as to resolve to add botany to the classical - studies imposed by authority. Later on he met with some women who elied out their slender means by collecting herbs for the druggists' shops, and, making their acquaintance, he used to pay them sixpence for each material item of information they were able to supply. During the next holidays he found in his mother's dressing room a ragged and dila'pdiated copy of Gerard's " Herball," containing descriptions and engravings of many of the commoner wild plants. He carried this off to school with great de light, and soon knew a great 'deal more about the plant life than his former instructors. The study brought a new and intense interest into his life. Leaving Eton in his eighteenth year, he was entered a gentleman commoner at Christchurch, Oxford, in December, 1760. The great university then, as now, was justly celebrated for its classical knowledge; but the pursuit of science was not encouraged. Apparently there was a Professor of Natural History there at the time, and young Banks added other branches of knowledge to his knowledge of plants. But, finding that no lectures were given in botany, he sought and obtained from the professor permission to procure a teacher to be paid by the students. He went off at once by stage coach to Cambridge, and brought back with him Mr Israel Lyons, astronomer and botanist, who afterwards published a small book on the Cambridge flora, and who later did some independent scientific work, thanks largely to the assistance Banks gave him. Banks's father died in 1761, and left him an ample fortune and the estate of Revesby Abbey, in Lincolnshire. He left Oxford in 1763 with an honorary degree, and in the following year entered on his patrimony. He had attracted attention' in the university by his superior attainments in natural history; and in May, 1766, he was elected Fellow of the Royal Society, surely one of the youngest men elected "to that honourable position. During the summer of that year he went to Newfoundland to collect plants, returning in the winter by way of Lisbon. All the time and everywhere he went his observing powers were active, and he was storing up a fund of information on the fauna and flora of the countries he visited.

After his return he made the acquaintance of Dr Daniel Solander, then employed as an assistant librarian at the British Museum ; and this ripened into an intimacy which was ended only by Solander's death. The latter had been a favourite pupil of the great Linnaeus, then the most famous of living naturalists, and he afterwards became Banks's companion in his voyage round the world, and subsequently his librarian till his death. In 1768 it was resolved to send an expedition round the world to observe the transit of Venus, and Captain James Cook was selected to command it. By his influence with Lord Sandwich, then First Lord of the Admiralty, Banks obtained permission to accompany Cook in the Endeavour; bait it is characteristic of the English Government that not only was permission, accorded grudgingly, but not a penny of public money was spent on it. Banks equipped his" part of the expedition at his own expense, and took with him Dr Solander, two draughtsmen —Mr Buchan for landscape and Mr Sydney Parkinson for objects of natural history,—and two attendants. The Endeavour left Plymouth on her famous voyage on August 25, 1768.

We are roost concerned with Banks's visit to New Zealand : but some incidents on the voyage so illustrate the vigour and force of character of this young enthusiast of 25 that I give them in the words of Dr Daydon Jackson, the present secretary of the Linnsean Society of London :

" They reached Lo Maire's Strait" fsouth of Tierra del Fnego) " in January, 1769. and Banks, with his assistants, gathered winter's bark" (Drimys Avinteri, a plant allied to our pepper tree) "in abundance. Here Banks, Solander, Green (the astronomer), and Moukhouse (the surgeon) started with a small ■party for a day's trip into the interior. Ascending a hill, they came upon a, swamp, where a fall of snow greatly incommoded and chilled them. Buchan, the artist, was

seized with a fit, and, a fire being lit, tho least-tired completed the ascent to the summit, and came down without much delay to the rendezvous. It was now 8 o'clock, and they pushed forwards to the ship, Banks bringing up the rear to prevent straggling. Dr Solander begged everyone to keep moving. The cold suddenly* became intense. Solander himself was the" first who lay down to rest, and at last fell asleep iu spite of all Banks's efforts. A few minutes afterwards some of the people who had been sent forward returned with the welcome news that a fire was burning a quarter of a mile in advance. Solander was aroused with the utmost difficulty, having almost lost the use of his limbs, and a black servant had nearly perished. The fire having been reached, Banks sent back two of those who seemed least affected by the cold to bring back the couple who were left with the negro. It was then found that a bottle of rum was in the knapsack of one of the men. The negro was roused by the spirit; but he and his companions drank too freelv of it, and all but one of them succumbed to the frost. Others of the party showed signs of frostbite ; but, thanks "to Banks's "indomitable energy, they were brought to the fire. Here they passed the night in a deplorable condition. They were nearly a day's journey from the vessel, and were destitute of food, except for a vulture which had been shot. It was past 8 in the morning before any signs of thaw set in; then they divided the vulture into 10 portions, about three mouthfuls apiece, and bv 10 it was possible to set out. To their great surprise they found themselves in three hours upon the beach." Banks kept a very full account of the voyage, which has been drawn up largely by nearly all writers who have edited various editions of Cook's Voyages, and his journal in full, edited by Sir J. D. Hooker, was published in London in 1896. After giving most interesting accounts of the Friendly Islands, and of the characters of the Tahitians, who were a very simple people in 1769 compared to the present inhabitants of the group, the journal records the continuation of the voyage to New Zealand, which was sighted on October 7. ' On the Bth a party landed at Poverty Bay, as it was called by the discoverers, but was attacked by the Natives, one of whom was shot through the heart. On the 9th another attempt was made to land, but the Natives received them with threatening demonstrations. The rest is best told in Banks's own words: "They constantly attempted to seize our arms, "or anything they could get, to that we were obliged to "fire on them and disperse them; none were, we hope, killed. Soon after we intercepted a Native canoe; but when we came up with it, the owners made so desperate a resistance that we were compelled to fire upon them, killing four; and the other three (boys) attempted to swim to shore, but were captured and taken on board the ship. .On finding that they were not to be killed, they at once recovered their spirits, and soon appeared to have forgotten everything that had happened. At supper they ate an enormous quantity of bread, and drank over a quart of water a-piece. Thus ended the most disagreeable day my life has yet seen; black be the mark for it, and heaven send that such may never return to embitter future reflection." It does not seem as if there was any justification in killing the Natives simply because they objected to be taken prisoners, and Banks, though he does not pass any judgment on his commander, evidently felt that the thing was very bad. The Endeavour sailed as far south as Cape Turnagain, and then went about, passing East Cape on October 30. Landings were made at various points, and numerous plants were collected, with what zest only those who have botanised in a country new to them can imagine. There was not much luxury on board ship in tho«e days, and the menu—even in the captain's quarters—was not of a very attractive nature. In the men's quarters the food must often have been abominable : for instance, the biscuits Avere so fearfully attacked by AA-eevils that they had to be rebaked so as to kill the insects, which "made the bread A-ery bitter."' So Are find that any change was ncceptnb'e. We read that on November 10 "about 20 slinks Avere soon killed, and as soon broiled and eaten, everyone de-' (Marina that thev Avere excel'ent food, as indeed I think they Avere. Hunger is certainly most excellent sauce." On the 14th thev caught abundance of crayfish— Banks calls them, and adds, "Thev are certainly the largest and best I have ever eaten." On the 20th they Avere up the river, which "the captain Avas so much pieced with that he resolved to call it the Thames." Here "I saAV the banks completely clothed with the finest timber my eyes' eA-er beheld, of a tree Ave had before seen, but only at a distance, in PovertA' Bav and TTaAvke's Bav. . . .

One—by no means the largest we had c,p eil 19ft Sin in circumference at 6ft above the ground, and its length from the root to the first branch 89ft," (The trees were white pines, Podocarpus dacrydieides.) On December 4, when up somewhere near the Bay of Islands, Banks notes that the Natives "showed us a great rarity, six plants of what thev called ' aouta,' from whence they make cloth like that of Otahite. The plant proved exactly the same, as the name is the Fame. Morus papvrifera. Linn (the paper mulberry). The same plant is used by the Chinese to make paper. Whether the climate does not acree with it. I do not know; but they seemed to value it very much. That it was verv scarce among them T am inclined to believe, as. we have not yet seen among them nieces larg.e enough for any use. but only bits sticking into the hollows of their ears." About December 24 they rounded Cape Maria van Diemen—without seeing it, however.—and while off the Three Kings Banks shot, from a boat, several "gannet or solan-areese, so like European ones that they were hardly distinguishable from them. As it was the humour of the ship

to keep Christmas in the old-fashioned way, it was resolved to make a goose-pie for to-morrow's dinner. 25th, Christmas Day : Our goose-pie was eaten with great approbation ; in the evening all hands were as drunk as our forefathers used to be upon like occasions." Other days, other ways.

On January 12. 1770. the ship was abreast of Mount Egmont, where, Banks says "with our glasses we could distinguish many white lumps in companies, 50 or 60 together, which were probably stones or tufts of grass, but bore much resemblance to flocks of sheep." Hooker says of tins observation that these were probably "clumps of the remarkable composite plant Raoulia mammillaris, Hook, t., or an allied species called 'vegetable sheep in New Zealand." There are no large Eaouhas on Mount Egmont, and Avliat the observers on the Endeavour probably saw were large clumps of some white-flowered plants, most likely Ourisia macrophylla, which grows in immense masses on the mountain, and is a very showy plant, which would be in full bloom in January. (To be Continued.)