London, and to whom he was duly apprenticed, as his brother James had
been before him. This change gave him more time and opportunity to
pursue his medical education. He attended lectures at the Sydenham
College, and, as has been seen, began to prepare for the matriculation
examination of the University of London. At the Sydenham College he met
with no little success, winning, besides certificates of merit in other
departments, a prize--his first prize--for botany. His vivid
recollections, given below, of this entry into the scientific arena are
taken from a journal he kept for his fiancee during his absence from
Sydney on the cruises of the "Rattlesnake."]

ON BOARD H.M.S. "RATTLESNAKE," CHRISTMAS 1847.

Next summer it will be six years since I made my first trial in the
world. My first public competition, small as it was, was an epoch in my
life. I had been attending (it was my first summer session) the
botanical lectures at Chelsea. One morning I observed a notice stuck
up--a notice of a public competition for medals, etc., to take place on
the 1st August (if I recollect right). It was then the end of May or
thereabouts. I remember looking longingly at the notice, and some one
said to me, "Why don't you go in and try for it?" I laughed at the idea,
for I was very young, and my knowledge somewhat of the vaguest.
Nevertheless I mentioned the matter to S. [his brother-in-law.] when I
returned home. He likewise advised me to try, and so I determined I
would. I set to work in earnest, and perseveringly applied myself to
such works as I could lay my hands on, Lindley's and De Candolle's
"Systems" and the "Annales des Sciences Naturelles" in the British
Museum. I tried to read Schleiden, but my German was insufficient.

For a young hand I worked really hard from eight or nine in the morning