Chapter 18

A FINDER OF PATHFINDERS

IN the selfsame year in which James Cook, then a mere Stripling, put to sea for the first time, the child who was destined to share the thrills and hazards of the redoubtable captain’s epoch-making voyages betrayed for the first time his innate flair for botanical research. This was Joseph Banks, popularly known years afterwards as the Grandfather of Australia, whose birthday we celebrate. The incident that gave direction to his life is worth recalling. As a schoolboy at Eton he was, one Summer evening, bathing in the Thames, and was enjoying his swim so much that he failed to notice the departure of his companions. In trudging his solitary way back to the school, he found himself in a leafy lane whose hedgerows were thickly carpeted with the most delicate and fragrant wild flowers. The charming spectacle threw him into transports of exquisite delight. From that moment all such growths captivated him; botany became the passion of every leisure hour. In recording the episode, his biographer observes that it is not too much to say that Australia was born in that lane that night.

Those who have closely scrutinized the story of Capt. Cook are well aware of the navigator’s stupendous indebtedness to Banks. To begin with, Banks not only possessed profound erudition and an earnest desire to use it for the public good; he also possessed great wealth. When he heard that the most serious difficulty in the way of organizing Capt. Cook’s expedition was financial, he fitted out the Endeavour at his own cost. Besides this, he unselfishly placed his own highly skilled services at Cook’s disposal and even engaged Dr. Solander and other experts to assist him. Later on, the young naturalist’s unquenchable thirst for botanical information led Capt. Cook to poke into all sorts of places that he would never otherwise have visited.

Nor did the contribution of Sir Joseph Banks to the destinies of Australia end here. For afterwards, as the historian says, ‘when Australia was lying bare, with nothing but the remnants of a British flag upon its shores, and a few marks scored on trees to show where Cook and Banks had been, it was Banks who, by years of effort, persuaded the British Government to send out and colonize the land. He did not know how great a thing he did, but he was actually laying the foundation of the Australian nation.’ The work that he performed even in his later years when, crippled by gout, he was confined to his couch and had to be carried on an invalid chair to his public appointments as president of the Royal Society, is one of the most extraordinary and unparalleled achievements in the story of the Empire.

He had time to reflect on the things that he had seen in different parts of the world. He remembered standing on the deck of the Endeavour watching the shores of vast but unknown lands pass, like a panorama, along the horizon; could he not dedicate his remaining energies to the task of inspiring young men with a passion for exploration? He set to work and succeeded most sensationally. Living in retirement, and in constant pain, in his English home, he coaxed adventurous young men to his fireside, and unfolded the vision of empty continents that haunted him, sleeping and waking. Many of them went back to their homes and offices, smiling superciliously. But on the minds of several of his listeners his story had the effect that he so fervently desired.

He contrived, for example, to excite the fancy of three young men who, as a result of those fireside conversations, wrote their names in letters indelible upon the world’s scroll of fame. They were Mungo Park, Lachlan Macquarie and John Franklin.

Mungo Park became, under the influence of Sir Joseph Banks, the pioneer of African exploration. Hi: began the work that was afterwards completed by Burton, Speke, Livingstone, Stanley and an army of dauntless and devoted pathfinders. Franklin, under the spell of Sir Joseph, turned his face to the White North, and, at the cost of his life, opened up the North West Passage. And Lachlan Macquarie, the third of that youthful triad, opened the gates of Australia and converted a microscopic and insignificant settlement-a mere group of squatters-into a huge continental dominion.

 Whenever we catch the thrill of African exploration; whenever we read afresh the stirring story of suffering and adventure in the icy polar seas; and whenever we feel the glow of ardent admiration as we contemplate the indomitable courage of our hardy Australian pioneers, we shall do well to allow our minds to journey one step farther back, and to conjure up the image of old Sir Joseph, his head propped up by pillows and his feet enswathed in bandages, chatting wi th his youthful proteges beside an English hearth. Nor do the three ponderous names that we have specifically mentioned exhaust the list. Sir Joseph Banks awoke the interest, informed the minds, and fired the fancies of a shining galaxy of brilliant scholars who, in their determination to exploit and classify the botanical and zoological curiosities and oddities of the Australian bush, incidentally opened up vast tracts of country, giving a new and ampler direction to Australian history. In their eagerness to add to the lustre of the sciences that they loved, they unconsciously, but incalculably, enriched the spacious theatre of their careful researches. Australia cherishes their names with jealous pride, but it cherishes even more the honoured name of the distinguished naturalist who first turned their attention to the scene of their ultimate triumphs. Capt. Cook and the great navigators, Lachlan Macquarie and the great administrators, can never be forgotten; but we cannot overlook the fact that their Homeric achievements were made possible by the modest but munificent services of a strong and silent man who was always happy to occupy a place in the background so long as the work was ably and effectively done.

Dr. F. W. Boreham