FORSTER (Jon's GEORGE ADAM), commonly called GEORGE, a distinguished naturalist and cir. cumnavigator, son of John Reinhold Forster, was born at Dantzic in 1754, and enjoyed, in his earliest youth, the advantage of his father's assiduous and affectionate instructions, by which he profited so ra pidly, that he was capable, at the age of ten years, when he went with his father into Russia, of ascer taining the species of a plant, by comparing it with the Linnean description. He was for a short time at a school in Petersburg. Upon his arrival in Lon don, he was at first placed in a merchant's counting house, but soon found his health unequal to the em ployment, and followed his father to Warrington, where he continued his studies at the academy with so much application, that he became perfect master of the English language, and otherwise distinguish ed himself by the strength of his memory and the vigour of his imagination ; at the same time that he assisted his father in giving lessons in French, and in completing a variety of translations of voyages and travels. He also accompanied his father, together with Sparrman, in the arduous engagement of ma king all kinds of physical observations in the circum navigation of the globe, and he was particularly em ployed in delineating the various objects of natural history which were discovered. After his return he was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society ; but he soon quitted England to settle at Paris. In 1779, however, he was appointed Professor of Natural His tory at Cassel; and, in 1784, he was nominated to a similar situation in the University of Wilna, where he took a degree of doctor of physic ; but he found little satisfaction in residing among a people so im perfectly civilized. The Empress of Russia had en gaged him to take an important part in a new voyage of discovery which she meditated ; but the design was abandoned upon the commencement of the war with the Turks. He was next invited by the Elector of Mentz to accept the appointment of President of the University, newly established in that city, and he was residing there at the time that the French army entered it. Being a declared 'republican in his police tical principles, he was dispatched as an envoy to Paris, to solicit the incorporation of Mentz with the French Republic; but during his absence, the Prus sian troops retook the city, and he lost the whole of his property, including his numerous manuscripts. He had married a Miss Theresa Hayne, and had one daughter as early as 1788; but, at a subsequent pe riod, his wife's conduct gave him great reason for un easiness, and though he affected to despise what he called the prejudices of social life, and to excuse her infidelity, and even attempted to facilitate her union with a more favoured admirer, still the affak in reali ty affected him deeply, and he resolved once more to leave Europe, as if in search of the waters of ob livion ; he was actually preparing for a voyage to Tibet, when his health was subdued by the ravages of a scorbutic disorder, and he died on the 13th Fe bruary 1792. Besides the assistance which he ren dered his father in many of his literary undertakings, he was also the author of a variety of separate pub lications under his own name.
1. A Voyage Round Me World in his Britannic Majesty's Ship Resolution, commanded by Captain James Cook, during the years 1772,1773, 1774, and 1775, 2 vols. 4to. London, 1777. In German, 2 vols. 4to. Berlin, 1779-1780; 3 vols. 8vo. 1784. The style of this work is rather more animated and poetical than that of the official account of the voyage; the second volume is considered•as the best written, and the freest from affectation and false sentiment.
2. Mr Wales, the astronomer of the expedition, pub 4 lished some remarks on the work, which occasioned a Reply to Mr Wales's Remarks, 8vo. London, 1778, in which the author declares, that his father had no concern whatever in the book, but admits that he had committed some few inaccuracies. 3. A Letter to the Earl of Sandwich, 4to. London, 1779. 4. His Answer to the Authors of the Literary Journal of Gottingen exhibits considerable warmth of language, but candidly admits some errors : it excited some further animadversions from Professor Meiners, who declared himself the author of' the criticisms. 5. In 1787, he published at Berlin, in 4to, A Translation of Captain Cook's Third Voyage, performed in 1776 1780, with an introduction and other additions. 6. A Description of the Gentiana saxosa. Swedish Trans. 1777, p. 183. 7. Life of Dr Dodd, 8vo. Berlin, 1779. 8. Preface to Sparrman's Travels, 8vo. Ber lin, 1784. 9. He undertook, together with Profes sor Lichtenberg, the publication of the Gottingen Magazine, which was continued from 1780 to 1785, and published in it, among other essays, A Descrip tion of the lied Creeper, or Certhia coccinea of 0 tvhyhee, I. vi. p. 346. 10. Experiments with Vital Air, Vol. III. ii. p. 281 ; examining its effects on glow-worms. 11. A Decad of New Plants. N. Act. Upsal. Vol. III. 1780, p. 171. 12. On Pygmies, liessiche Beytriige. Vol. I. p. 1, 1785. 13. His tory and Description of the Bread Fruit Tree, p.208, 384 ; also separately, 4to. Cassel, 1784. 14. Flo ruke Insularum Australium Prodromus, 8vo. Got tingen, 1786. 15. Fasciculus Plantarum Magella nicarum, Commentat. Soc. Gott. Vol. IX. p. 13. 16. Plantce Atlanticce, p. 46. 17. Miscellanies, or Es says on Moral and Physical Geography, Natural His tory, and Moral Philosophy, 6 vols. 8vo. Leipsic and Berlin, 1789-1797; the two last volumes are posthumous, and chiefly of a political nature. 18. Picture of the Lower Rhine, Brabant, Flanders, Hol land, England, and France, taken in the year 1790, 3 vols. 8vo. Berlin, 1791-1794. Dutch, Haarlem, 1792, 1793. French, called Voyage Philosophigue, 2 vols. 8vo. Paris, 1795, 1796. This work contains many interesting remarks on manners and on the arts, showing that the author possessed very extensive in formation, as well as originality of talent ; but there is too much affectation of sentiment, and an injudi cious display of hostility to Great Britain. 19. His torical Remembrances of the Year 1790, 8vo. Ber lin, 1798. There are also several political pam phlets of a temporary nature, which could add little or nothing to their author's fame; and a few scattered memoirs in different periodical publications. He was also concerned in the Collection of Voyages, publish ed by Professor Sprengel ; and, together with Pallas and others, in an edition of Martini's Dictionary of Natural History. Indeed, his life, though short, was one continued scene of literary activity ; but his ap• plication to the labour of compilation was too unre mitting to allow him to concentrate the whole force of his mind on the performance of any one great ori ginal work of genius. The Sketches of the Mytholo gy and Customs of the Hindoos were written by an other author of the same name.
(Life by Pougens. J. R. Forster in Jacobi's An nals, and in the Dedication of his Enchiridion. Eyries in Biographie Universelle, Vol. XV. 8vo. Paris, 1816. Aikin's General Biography, Vol. IV. 4to. London, 1808. Chalmers's Biographkal Dictionary, Vol. XIII. 8vo. London, 1814.) (rt. a.)