Some men travel for their amusement,—others to acquire knowledge, and not a few in search of health; I was unfortunately of the latter class. That most severe of all human ailments, gout, had made such inroads upon a constitution, otherwise sound, and had so-enfeebled a frame, originally strong, that before I was fifty years of age I could with difficulty walk a hundred yards, and was seldom free from pain and suffering for a week together. The usual remedies had failed to produce any permanent relief, and as a last chance it was recommended that I should try the effects of a warm climate.

When the opinion of friends so entirely coincides with one's own wishes, as this did with mine, it is pretty certain their advice will be followed. I therefore was not long in soliciting to be placed on the full pay of my commission as a Deputy Inspector General of Army Hospitals, being well aware that wherever an officer of my rank might be required, it would be in a more southern latitude than that of England. My request, after a reasonable time, was granted. I expected to have been sent to the Mediterranean, where the vacancy had occurred that admitted of my being employed, but in this was disappointed; an officer was removed from Barbados to Corfu, and I was ordered to the West Indies. I cannot say that I felt it as any very great disappointment.