INTRODUCTION. WITII Lieutenant Cook, in this voyage, embarked Joseph Banks, Esq. a gentleman possessed of consi. derable landed property in Lincolnshire. He received the education of a scholar rather to qualify him for the enjoyments than the labours of life; yet an ardent desire to know more of nature than could be learnt from books, determined him at a very early age, to forego what are generally thought to be the principal advantages of a liberal fortune, and to apply his revenue not in procuring the plea. sures of leisure and ease, but in the pursuit of his favourite study, through a series of fatigue and dan. ger, which, in such circumstances, have very seldom been voluntarily incurred, except to gratify the restless and insatiable desires of avarice or ambition, Upon his leaving the university of Oxford, in the ar 1763, he crossed the Atlantic, and visited the asts of Newfoundland and Labradore. The danger, ficulty, and inconvenience that attend long voyges are very different in idea and experience; Mr. Banks however returned, undiscouraged by his first pedition; and when he found that the Endeavour is equipping for a voyage to the South Seas, in order observe the transit of Venus, and afterwards atpt farther discoveries, he determined to embark the expedition, that he might enrich his native ountry with a tribute of knowledge from those VOL. IV. B which have been hitherto unknown, and not without hope of leaving among the rude and uncultivated nations that he might discover, something that would render life of more value, and enrich them perhaps in a certain degree with the knowledge, or at least with the productions, of Europe. As he was determined to spare no expence in the execution of his plan, he engaged Dr. Solander to accompany him in the voyage. This gentleman, by birth a Swede, was educated under the celebrated Linnæus, from whom he brought letters of recommendation into England, and his merit being soonknown, he obtained an appointment in the British Museum, a public institution, which was then just established; such a companion Mr. Banks considered as an acquisition of no small importance, and to his great satisfaction the event abundantly proved that he was not mistaken. He also took with him two draftsmen, one to delineate views and figures, the other to gain such subjects of natural history as might offer; together with a secretary and four ser. vants, two of whom were negroes. Mr. Banks kept an accurate and circumstantial journal of the voyage, and soon after I had received that of Captain Cook from the Admiralty, was so obliging as to put it into my hands, with permission to take out of it whatever I thought would improve or embellish the narrative. This was an offer of which I gladly and thankfully accepted; I knew the advantage would be great, for few philosophers have furnished materials for accounts of voyages undertaken to discover new countries. The adventurers in such expeditions have generally looked only upon the great outline of nature, without attending to the variety of shades within, which give life and beauty to the piece. The papers of Captain Cook contained a very particular account of all the nautical incidents of the voyage, and a very minute description of the figure |