“CHAS. CLERKE.”

This is followed by another, written on the evening of the same day, in which he says:—­

“I this day received a letter from Lord Sandwich, acquainting me he shall certainly order the Discovery to sea very soon, in short giving me to understand that if I cannot leave town by the 10th or 11th instant I must give up all.  Now, that completes the wretchedness of my situation.  I find the Jews are exasperated and determined to spare no pains to arrest me if they could once catch me out of the rules of the Bench; this, you know, would be striking the finishing stroke.  Let me, my good friend, entreat the influence of your friendship here.  I shall certainly be cleared the 16th or 18th instant, and shall then be happy.”

He got away all right, and on November 23rd, 1776, wrote from the Cape of Good Hope:—­

“Here I am hard and fast moor’d alongside my old friend Capt’n Cook, so that our battles with the Israelites cannot now have any ill effects upon our intending attack upon the North Pole.  I think I acquainted you from Plymouth, on the 1st of August, that I was getting under-way; I then got a good outset with [Sidenote:  1779] a fresh easterly breeze, and made a very good passage to within a few leagues of this land without any kind of accident befalling us....  We shall now sail in a very few days, and return to the old trade of exploring, so can only say adieu, adieu, my very good friend.  Be assured that, happen what will, it is wholly out of the power of durance of time or length of space in the least to alleviate that sense of gratitude your goodness has inspired; but, indeed, I shall ever endeavour upon all and every occasion to acquit myself,” etc.

The next letter is a pathetic farewell to his friend, written on the 17th of August, 1779, five days before the author’s death:—­

“MY EVER-HONOURED FRIEND,—­The disorder I was attacked with in the King’s Bench Prison has proved consumptive, with which I have battled with various success, although without one single day’s health, since I took leave of you in Burlington Street; it is now so far got the better of me that I am not able to turn myself in my bed, so that my stay in this world must be of very short duration.  However, I hope my friends will have no occasion to blush in owning themselves such, for I have most perfectly and justly done my duty to my country as far as my abilities would enable me, for where that has been concerned the attention to my health, which I was most sensible was in the most imminent danger, has never swerved me a single half-mile out of the road of duty; so that I flatter myself I shall leave behind that character that it has ever been my utmost ambition to attain, which is that of an honest and faithful servant to the public whom I had undertaken to serve.

“I have made you the best collections