George Bass (1771 - 1803)
While more renowned for his explorations, Bass continued the tradition
of other naval surgeons serving in Australia such as John
White, Denis Considen and Archibald
Menzies in being a keen observer and collector of Australian natural
history curiosities. He too forwarded to Banks those items which
survived his arduous voyages:
"In this voyage of fourteen weeks I collected those few plants upon
Van Diemen's Land which had not been familiar to me in New South Wales,
and have done myself the honour of submitting them to your inspection."
Along with Paterson, he was made an
honorary member of the Society for Promoting Natural History, which later
merged with the Linnean Society. Some of his observations were published
in the second volume of David Collins's An account of the English colony
in New South Wales. There is apparently an unpublished manuscript
on the wombat within the Banksian papers held in the Mitchell Library,
Sydney.
Extracted from: R.M.&W.R. Baker (1990) Botanical
Contributions Overlooked... , in History of Systematic Botany in
Australasia., ASBS, P.S. Short Ed. [consult for source references]
