The hardships and sufferings of Terra-del-Fuego and of Batavia had not yet taken off the edge of his appetite for remote voyages. [Sidenote: THE EXPEDITION TO ICELAND.] He expended some thousands of pounds in buying instruments and making preparations for a new expedition with COOK, [Sidenote: 1772. July.] but the foolish and obstructive conduct of our Navy Board inspired him with a temporary disgust. He then turned his attention to Northern Europe. He resolved that after visiting the western isles of Scotland he would explore Iceland. SOLANDER was again his companion, together with two other northern naturalists, Drs. LIND and VON TROIL. BANKS chartered a vessel at his own cost (amounting, for the ship alone, to about six hundred pounds). Before starting for the cold north, they refreshed their eyes with the soft beauties of the Isle of Wight. There, said one of the delighted party, ‘Nature has spared none of her favours;’ and a good many of us have unconsciously repeated his remark, long afterwards. They reached the Western Isles of Scotland before the end of July, and, after a long visit, explored Staffa, the wonders of which were then almost unknown. Scientific attention, indeed, was first called to them by BANKS, when he communicated to Thomas PENNANT, of Downing, his minute survey, and his drawings of the basaltic columns. He thought that the mind can scarcely conceive of anything more splendid, in its kind, than the now famous cave. [Sidenote: THE VISIT TO STAFFA.] When he asked the local name of it, his guide gave him an answer which, to Mr. BANKS, seemed to need explanation, [Sidenote: 1772. August 12.] though the name has nowadays become but too familiar to our ears. ‘The Cave of FIUHN,’ said the islander. ‘Who or what is “Fiuhn”?’ rejoined BANKS. The stone, he says, of which the pillars are formed, is a coarse kind of basalt, much resembling the ‘Giants’ Causeway’ in Ireland, ‘though none of them so neat as the specimens of the latter which I have seen at the British Museum.... [Sidenote: Banks to Pennant; Aug., 1772.] Here, it is dirty brown; in the Irish, a fine black.’ But he carried away with him the fullest impression of the amazing grandeur of the whole scene. [Sidenote: THE TOUR IN ICELAND.] The tourists reached Iceland on the twenty-eighth of August. They explored the country, and saw everything notable which it contained. On the twenty-first of September they visited the most conspicuous of the _geysers_, or hot-springs, and spent thirteen hours in examining them. On the twenty-fourth, they explored Mount Hecla.