He arrived in Callao in January 1778, and soon gathered a large herbarium of the Peruvian flora, also accumulating much valuable information concerning the cinchona tree.

[1] Dombey sought at once to replace this loss, and soon had in readiness a second shipment, but the authorities of Callao confiscated over 300 original designs of rare plants on the pretext that works of native artists were not permitted to be exported to foreign countries.

During his stay in Concepción the cholera broke out, and at once Dombey offered his services and was appointed physician-in-chief of the city, which office he resigned in 1783 when the epidemic had passed.

Here he suffered the loss of half of his collections, which were seized by the Spanish government and himself imprisoned until he agreed not to publish his researches prior to Pavón and Ruiz.

[1] Dombey's collections are among the treasures of the British Museum, the Real Jardín Botánico de Madrid, and the Jardin des Plantes and the Muséum national d'histoire naturelle of Paris.