He was now received with distinguished honour by the African Association, and the various literary men whom he met with in London. In the mean time his travels, which the Association permitted him to publish on his own account, were announced; and both during his stay in London, and the visit which he paid to his friends in Scotland, all his leisure hours were devoted to the compiling and arranging of the materials for the work. It appeared in the spring of 1799, and immediately acquired that degree of popularity which it has ever since maintained. In the composition of his travels, however, he was assisted by Bryan Edwards, author of a “History of the West Indies,” an advocate of the slave-trade, in deference to whom Park is said to have suppressed his own opinions, which had a contrary tendency. The apology offered for this mean compliance is, that Bryan Edwards, being secretary to the African Association, had it in his power greatly to influence the future fortunes of our traveller. I should prefer supposing that his arguments produced a temporary conviction upon Park’s mind, unless some more convincing proof than has yet been brought forward could be adduced to substantiate the accusation of so remarkable a deficiency of moral courage in a man in whom, on all other occasions, courage seemed to be the prevailing virtue. However this may be, Park again returned to Scotland soon after the publication of his travels, where, on the 2d of August, 1799, he married one of the daughters of Mr. Anderson, of Selkirk, with whom he had served his apprenticeship. He now seemed to have forgotten his ambitious feelings, and for more than two years resided on the farm at Fowlshiels, with his mother and one of his brothers. He then removed to the town of Peebles, where he resumed the practice of his profession, and seems, in a short time, to have acquired a good share of the business of the place. But it will easily be imagined that the quiet obscure life of a country surgeon could possess no charms for an ardent ambitious mind like Park’s. He longed to be performing upon some more stirring scene. In this dreary solitude, therefore, where the indulgence of day-dreams would appear to have been his principal amusement, scheme after scheme seems to have presented itself to his mind, each giving way in its turn to another equally impracticable. At length he received, through the medium of Sir Joseph Banks, intelligence that the African Association were once more about to send a mission into the interior of Africa, for the purpose of penetrating to and navigating the Niger; and that, in case government should enter into the plan, he himself would certainly be recommended as the person proper to be employed for carrying it into execution.