Journal recording the completion of the expedition, return to Shanghai (reached 9 July), and subsequent embarkation on the Peninsular and Oriental (P.&O.) steamer Aden (3 August) for Ceylon, via Singapore, with later entries on elephant hunting expeditions in Ceylon

Date:
17 June-18 October 1861
Reference:
MS.7591
Part of:
Barton, Alfred Bowyer (1825-1905), FRCS
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view Journal recording the completion of the expedition, return to Shanghai (reached 9 July), and subsequent embarkation on the Peninsular and Oriental (P.&O.) steamer <i>Aden</i> (3 August) for Ceylon, via Singapore, with later entries on elephant hunting expeditions in Ceylon

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Journal recording the completion of the expedition, return to Shanghai (reached 9 July), and subsequent embarkation on the Peninsular and Oriental (P.&O.) steamer <i>Aden</i> (3 August) for Ceylon, via Singapore, with later entries on elephant hunting expeditions in Ceylon. Public Domain Mark. Source: Wellcome Collection.

About this work

Description

A fair copy, in the same hand as MS. 7589.

There is a sketch map of Ceylon at f.28v.

Barton's route from to Ceylon takes him along the coast of Cochin China, down the China Sea to Malaya then to Singapore, passing Java and Sumatra. Barton is hosted along the way by various P.& O. steamer captains and company agents. He describes his fellow passengers in detail including an American doctor anxious to get home to wife and family because of the Civil War and conditions in the South.

From Columbo Barton and his party head towards Kandy the hill capital of the island, engage servants and porters and arrange transport. Barton's account of his six-week stay in Ceylon includes descriptions of the local population, British settlers, the valleys and lush scenery, their diet, wet weather, wildlife and hunting prey (deer, elk, jungle fowl, buffalo, boars, pigs and hares). Exciting accounts of their first successful elephant hunts can be found between ff.48-56. Measurements of the elephants the party shoot are entered in the journal. Barton experiences problems with his hired help, develops a swollen shoulder and the whole party suffer from the intense heat, fevers, the red and black ants and the mosquitoes. The party return to the coast by mid-October, much to their general relief.

Publication/Creation

17 June-18 October 1861

Physical description

75 ff. 1 volume: 228 x 180 mm.

Finding aids

Database description transcribed from Richard Aspin and Christopher Hilton's typescript supplement to S.A.J Moorat's Catalogue of Western Manuscripts.

Location of duplicates

Hand-drawn map of Ceylon (Sri Lanka) 1861: Wellcome Images ref L0049846

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