supplied many of the vessels with provisions, but the Salem was one of the unfortunate ones, and had to work out her own salvation. When at last she reached Liverpool, young Barnett was famished and utterly worn out, and on reaching home his ardour for a sailor's life had, as might be expected, considerably abated.
He now decided to enter the medical profession, and after a full course of study at Queen's College successfully passed his examinations and became a member of the Royal College of Surgeons, England. On the 20th of January, 1855, he entered the Peninsular and Oriental Company's service, and was sent to join a ship at Suez. This was before the canal was constructed, and in order to reach his ship at Suez Dr. Barnett had to land at Alexandria, travel to Cairo, and cross the dreary desert. He made several voyages to Bombay, Ceylon, Calcutta, Singapore, Hong Kong, Shanghai, and other Eastern ports, in the mail steamer Bengal. In the beginning of 1856, at the request of the English and American merchants at Foochow, he left the P. and O. service and settled in practice at that port. The hard work, combined with the unhealthy climate, was too much for his constitution, and he was compelled to travel to recuperate. The gold diggings of California were still prosperous, and Dr. Barnett wisely decided to seek health amid the varying scenes of digger life. In the commencement of 1859, after a short trip to Manilla, he sailed in an American ship for California. During his long residence in China he had several encounters with the natives. Once in Foochow the townspeople attacked the Cantonese servants of the foreign merchants, whom the masters had to defend, and during the fight Howard Cunningham, a young American, and a good friend of Dr. Barnett's, was killed close to him, by a spear which penetrated his liver. Again, when with two companions he sailed in a Portuguese lorcha for Ningpo, the party was attacked at the entrance of the river by two large junks, but managed to avoid the dreaded stinkpots and prove that Eley's green cartridges, when judiciously used, are more than a match for gingalls. On a third occasion, after forming one of a shooting party on the mainland, about twenty miles from Hong Kong, when stopping at an old Buddhist monastery on a hill, they were attacked by a large party of pirates. All the Chinese servants ran away, and the doctor and his friends had to fight their way to the coast, where the boat was waiting for them. On arriving at Hong Kong, they reported the occurrence to the then Governor (Sir John Bowring), who, as the pirates in question had previously given much trouble, immediately ordered a gunboat to proceed to the spot and shell tle village,
On landing at San Francisco, Dr. Barnett proceeded on horseback right through California, seeing and associating with the principal actors in the fierce race for wealth, men with whom Mark Twain and Bret Harte have made the world familiar. He also visited the then newly-discovered groves of mammoth trees and the Yosemite Valley, in which he camped for several days, there being no house in the place at the time. This tour, which he states was the most enjoyable he ever made, was the means of completely renewing his health. His next journey was by rail, across the Isthmus of Panama, and by boat through the Gulf of Mexico. Landing at New York, he travelled in the States and Canada, remaining some time at Niagara. Then, leaving Boston by the Cunard steamer Europa, he went to England round the north coast of Ireland, seeing in its fullest perfection the aurora borealis, a poetical description of which he published in a London newspaper. From Liverpool he went to Edinburgh, passed the necessary examinations, and became a licentiate of the Royal College of Physicians. After revisiting the Highlands, this time on foot, and taking a short run on the Continent, he embarked once more on the sea, in the ship Flower of the Forest, which left London in 1861, bound for Melbourne. During a violent storm in the Bay of Biscay the ship was dismasted, and Dr. Barnett was required to amputate the leg of a sailor who fell from aloft. This occurred at midnight, and as the cabin lamps were broken, and only one man could be spared from the work of cutting away the wreckage which, knocking against the side of the ship, threatened her destruct:ion, the operation was a delicate one. By the light of a single candle the intrepid doctor, despite the fact that the ship was bobbing like a cork in the heavy sea, commenced his task, and performed the operation successfully. The vessel was so seriously damaged that she had to put back to the nearest port—Cork—to refit. During her detention, Dr. Barnett visited the Lakes of Killarney. On reaching Melbourne, he passed most of 1861 in touring the colonies of Victoria, New South Wales, and Queensland. The latter colony was not very well known at this time, and, ever on the search for fresh scenes, he decided to penetrate its vastnesses. He purchased horses in Sydney, and proceeded by steamer to Moreton Bay, whence he took his departure into the bushlands. He was away for many months, and wrote several interesting and instructive articles on his travels, which were published in Chambers's Journal and other English magazines. On his return to England, he was made a Fellow of the Royal Geographical Society, and was highly commended for his work, which was really of an exploring character. On reaching London, he entered the service of the African Steamship Company, and made three successive voyages to the West Coast of Africa. Early in 1868 he was appointed by the Secretary for the Colonies (the Duke of Buckingham) Colonial Surgeon at York, Western Australia, and he landed at Fremantle from the ship Lady Louise in June, 1868. For some time he did duty at York, until an injury to his knee brought on such severe inflammation of the joint that he was compelled to visit Perth to undergo amputation. Despite this misfortune Dr. Barnett continued his work with unabated vigour until 1872, when Governor Weld appointed him Colonial Surgeon at Fremantle, an office which he held for twenty-three years. This position included the duties of Health Officer to the port—boarding ships and visiting the Aboriginal Convict Prison at Rottnest. The bad sanitary condition of the majority of the towns throughout the colony was severely commented upon by the doctor in a series of letters to the press, in which he sought to warn the people of the risks they ran by the culpable negligence of all sanitary rules. He pointed out how the danger could be avoided, and the letters were thought so highly of by Governor Weld that he had them issued in pamphlet form from the office of the Government Printer. In 1891 Dr. Barnett was granted extended leave of absence, and going home by the P. and O. Company's steamer Victoria landed in England after an absence of twenty-four years. He visited nearly every part of the British Isles, and returned to the colony by the Oceans in 1892. Three years later the office of Colonial Surgeon at Fremantle was abolished, and Dr. Barnett was appointed to the sole charge of the Lunatic Asylum as Medical Superintendent. In speaking of his work in the asylum he deplores the increase of lunacy in the colony, which he attributes to the practice so common in remote parts, of intermarriage among people who have hereditary predisposition to insanity. Dr. Barnett was gazetted a Justice of
