ty discreditable to the character of an Englishman.

However, he had more honourable distinctions. In the furious
Revolutionary war--a war of principles and passions, not less than of
public interests, the president of the Royal Society largely exerted his
interest with both governments, to alleviate the sufferings of
scientific men who happened to fall into the hands of the belligerents,
and to effect the restoration of scientific property captured by our
ships of war. In 1802 he was chosen one of the foreign members of the
Institute of France; and his letter of thanks, a little too ardent in
its gratitude, was said to have involved the baronet in some vexations
peculiarly felt by his courtly temperament. He was instantly attacked
for his Gallican panegyric, by a portion of the Royal Society. Cobbett,
who was then looking out for a victim, and whose loyalty was at that
period peculiarly glowing, flew at him like a tiger-cat; and, last and
most dreaded of all, he was said to have received at Windsor some of
those frowns, which to a courtier are a total eclipse of the sun. But
the nation soon had higher things to think of than a slip of the
President's pen, or a little betrayal of his vanity. Napoleon ascended
the throne; and, when the thunderbolts began to fall, the squibs and
crackers flung from hand to hand of little men are of necessity
forgotten.

His latter years were signalized by acts of unequivocal public service.
He is designated by Lord Brougham, and no one can have a better right to
be informed of the fact, as the real founder of the African
Association.--His lordship also regards him as the real founder of the
colony of Botany Bay.--He was the first to suggest the transfer of the
tropical fruits to the West India islands.--British horticulture owed
him great services.--And the British Museum, during forty-two years of
his trusteeship, was the object of his peculiar care, and finally
received the bequest of his excellent library and of all his
collections.

His career, however, was now, by the course of nature, drawing to its
close. Yet, he had lived seventy-eight years in this anxious and
disappointing world, in opulence, in peace, and in public estimation.
But his lot had been singularly fortunate. Few men are without their
share of those troubles which characterize the general condition of
human nature. Sir Joseph Banks had _his_ trial, in physical suffering.
In the first portion of his life he had been