EARLE, AUGUSTUS (b. 1798) was an Englishman and was educated as an artist. Imbued from his youth with a love of travel, he persuaded the Admiralty to allow him in 1815 to live in his brother's gunboat on the Mediterranean station. There he witnessed the operations of Lord Exmouth against the Barbary States and afterwards, with the help of the Dey of Algiers, he made many sketches of the ruins of Carthage and other places. It was the middle of 1817 before he returned to England with many beautiful sketches of the Mediterranean.

In Mar 1818 he left for the United States, where he spent two years, then proceeded to South America, practising as an artist with considerable success for six months in Lima and working his way back to Rio in the hope of finding a passage to India. The brig in which he sailed was driven into Tristan d'Acunha where he had to remain some months before the Admiral Cockburn arrived, bound for Van Diemen's Land. Earle sketched with great profit in the Australian colonies and on 30 Oct 1827 landed in Hokianga from the Governor Macquarie. He spent six months sketching and studying the manners of the Maori people from his headquarters at Kororareka. By roundabout routes he found his way to Madras, where also he made sketches for use in Burford's panorama in Leicester Square, London. Eventually he reached England again in the trader Resource. His journals were published in 1832 as The Narrative of a Nine Months Residence in New Zealand. By this time Earle was again at sea as draughtsman in H.M. surveying ship Beagle. This brought him again to New Zealand and he made further sketches, some of which were reproduced in the New Zealand Association's portfolio in 1838.

Earle, op. cit. (biographical introduction); Hocken, Bibliog.

Reference: Volume 1, page 129

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