home, deeply involved us in his misfortunes. These disappointments, however, we were well convinced, arose from the purest intentions, although success did not attend him; which is not unfrequently the case with the most deserving. On his return to England, therefore, after an absence of nine years, it was natural for him to feel his disappointments with their utmost poignancy, which intimidated him from making any exertions with his usual spirits. The chief thing he now proposed was to get his Voyages and Travels published, which it was not in his power to do but by subscription; and though he got many subscribers, yet they came in by such slow degrees, which with the loss of his most inestimable friend and patron, prevented his accomplishing this design; as also, one he had formed in the West Indies, which was once more to return to Africa, on a plan of his own, with the sanguine hope of relieving an hitherto oppressed race of beings, and abolishing that, to him, most detestable of all traffic-the SLAVE TRADE.

His loss is too melancholy for me to dwell upon; to me it is irreparable; and I wish it may not be so to the objects of his attention. But they, not being thoroughly acquainted with his virtues, could set no proper estimation on his value, although many of them had experienced his kindness, he having advanced a great deal of money amongst those he thought most necessitous, which is now entirely lost. He was, indeed, of a

most benevolent disposition; his heart was always open to the real or pretended distresses of all who came to his knowledge; and he too often, without consulting his own situation, relieved them at a time when, perhaps, his own necessities were at least equal to their's.

I must once more request your excuse for the manner in which I have related these simple facts as they occurred to my memory; most of which will only serve to show you the difficulties which attended him in every situation.

I have not sent his Treatise on Education, nor on Progressive Motion, as you seemed to think they would turn to little advantage; but if you should choose to have them, or any other papers, or information that I can give, a line addressed to me, &c. &c. will be esteemed a favour by Sir, your most obliged and humble servant, ELIZ. SMEATHMAN.

LETTER CLXXII.

Mr. HENRY SMEATHMAN to Dr. LETTSOM.

Sir,

Sierra Leone, June 22, 1773.

I have long been in hopes that some discovery in the mineral kingdom would have given me a much better excuse for addressing you, than that I can at present urge.

I have been much disappointed. The coast, as far as I have seen of it, does not promise any variety of metal; even very few fossils are to be found. For about sixty leagues extent upon the coast, the cliffs are red earth, gravel, rocks mixed with mica, much resembling the Scotch granite, and red rocks, honey-combed and irregular, like the clinkers or slag that is left in the distiller's and brewer's furnaces, when the coals are consumed.

These rocks seem as if they had once been in a liquid state, or fused by heat. They are filled in many places with small red stones, and pebbles, and pieces of loadstone, which we sometimes find with a tolerable degree of magnetical virtue. In some places ese rocks seem replete with iron ore; in a liquid state at some period, one would imagine, as immense masses of the granite rock are cemented together by it.

Nature does not seem to have indulged herself in many freaks with the stones and pebbles. The solitary shores wear an uniform dull appearance, either of granite rocks or large masses of iron ore.

It is certain that metal abounds in the interior parts, as they make all their own instruments with it, and I will answer for it they do not venture far under ground in search of it. There is very little spar to be seen amongst the pebbles, and none of those variegated pebbles, belemnites, incrustations, &c. which are so amusing on the English shores.

A great Black trader here has got some kind of

spar, which is very white: it does not break into particular forms, but like flint glass; and cuts glass like a diamond. He received it from some interior port, and at first had some hopes of its being a precious stone. I have got a specimen.

The Plantane Isles are very low, and the soil almost entirely sand. It has many of the iron rocks. about it; but it has rocks too of the same colour, as soft as the ill-made, half-burnt bricks, which have been used of late years in some of the buildings about London.

These seem to be composed of red ochre and sand. I have found in many of them hollow cylinders of a rather more firm substance than the other parts of the rock; but so liable to break that I have not, for want of a convenient conveyance, been able to get one home perfect. In the sand, amongst these rocks, I have found red, yellow, and I think it is white ochre: the former of a good colour. If it were worth while, I think many tons might be procured at those islands.

A great distance up the river Sherbro, there is found a white ochre or clay, which the women use in painting their faces. I have not yet been able to get a specimen. There is very little clay in the country; perhaps none that is not mixed with onehalf, or two-thirds, sand. I know I know my remarks on this branch are crude and unimportant. You have then, Sir, a strong proof that I entertain a great opinion of your candour and abilities; the former will induce you to excuse my inaccuracy, the latter

enable you, and I have no doubt your goodness will prompt you, to give me the best advice how I may profit by the present opportunity of investigating the minerals and fossils of the coast. I have got Cronstedt's Mineralogy; but the exigencies of my situation afford little time for study. I have sent home some insects, which I hope will gratify the curious in that division of natural history. I am in hopes, before long, to send home specimens in all the rest. At present I am roaming about the coast in search of provisions and necessaries, which are scarce, from some ships being lost in their way here.

I am, Sir,

Your obliged

humble servant,

HENRY SMEATHMAN.

Sir,

LETTER CLXXIII.

From the same.

Bense Island, June 26, 1773. The minerals and fossils of this part of the coast, I apprehend, will not afford much interesting matter to naturalists. The Mahometan blacks sometimes bring pieces of gold shaped like unto what are, by the traders, called the country rings. They are made of pure metal, and very thin, and