^^ Retrospective Criticism, 



Art. IV. Retrospective Criticism. 



Critical Remarks on Ko. XVI. 



ti ^ift Summa sequar fastigia rerum." . iq t>\;Fiir^L : 

 i r !(^* J shall trace the principal heads.??; . ; {,■<■ » j - , 



Sir, The Third Volume of your Magazine is now brought to a close ; and 

 t shall take the liberty of offering a few remarks on some of the chief con- 

 tents of the Sixteenth Number, which is just published, and completes the 

 volume. ' I select the last Number for the vehicle of my observations, 

 intending to make it serve, in some sort, as a sample by which to assa^ 

 the work at large ; for what is true of a part, rs, generally speaking, more 

 or less triie of the whole.'' •"»'"!'"'*''■ ^ ■ >--' '-^ /' » ;; . 



In the first place, then, liaVii)g:;bn';'i'Tdrfi5ret^*WciraM66 (Vk IIl!^t^.'89.) 

 presumed' to criticisej iu'rio 'v^ry compKirientAry telrlis, the vignette title- 

 page which yoii had 'the 'liberality td give to your re-Ad^ts fof'th'e fii-Sttwo 

 volumes, I think "if is biit an act of common justice on the present to 

 express niy entire satisfaction at the newoiie which you have now given us for 

 Vol. III.' Neat aVid unassuming, and free from the glaring faults of its elder 

 brother, it sufficiently answers the purpose intended; and the execution 

 of the blocks which,- if t may judge from mydwtt. copy, gives a very bril- 

 liant impi-esstori, niyy-'be'c(^ns{cler0ci,' oh'.the 'whol^^ to'be ci^editable to the 

 artist erilplbjed. Aft.er the 't'itlepage combes the preface, frotii which I rejoice 

 to learn thiat the number df contributors to your pcriodic^al has greatly 

 increased; a circumstance which tends to show that there is ah increasing 

 taste for the study 6f natural history throughout the country ,' to' the 

 formation of which taste 7/oti probably have in no slight degree c6ntri- 

 buted. ' I als6' congratulate y6u on having been the person first td design 

 and start siich' a work, and, as I now trust, to have established it oh a firm 

 and permanent footing. There is much need, it strikes me,of suc''h a miscel- 

 lany as yours, not onl}' to facilitate the intercourse between ndturtilists 

 personally Imknown ' to each other, and widely separated by distance of 

 situation ; but also to afford a Vehicle by which to communicate facts and 

 remarks, which, however interesting or important, are yet, in point of 

 bulk, too inconsiderable to form any thing like a separate treatise, and to 

 be ^ent into the world by themselves. Of your numerous contrlbrutors' I 

 suppose there is not one in fifty who would ever have thought of swelling 

 out his lucubrations even into the size of a pamphlet, and running the risk 

 of publishing the result of his observations at his own hazard. Wete it 

 not, therefore,' for some such general receptacle as is afforded by your 

 Magazine, many an interesting remark and useful piece of information 

 would in all probability never have been given to the world at all. 



But to proceed: the Glossarial Index, which you have now for the 

 first thne appended to your volume, is, in my niind, a most useful and 

 desirable commodity. In the present specimen,' however, thefe: are, 

 I think, sOme omissions, and more superfluities; for example, ■'the very 

 first word I chanced to loOk for,— -merely because it caught my eye 

 in the page (522.) I happened tO have opened, — was the word " opercu- 

 lum," which is not to be found in the glossary, though it more particularly 

 deserved to be noticed, as it appears to be used in the page referred to in a 

 sense somewhat different from that in which it is often employed. Again, 

 the word' " adductors " (p. 526.)' is omitted. Now surely such words 

 ought to have found a place in the Glossarial Index, rather than those^ of 

 such common occurrence arid easy comprehension, as " alse," "antennae," 

 "caput," "formosum," '« lanceOIate," " oculi," " os," " pectoral," " pes," 

 ^* proboscis," &c. I am, however, mOre disposed to find fault with your sins 

 of omission than commission ; and do not object to your insertion of the 



