332 Reply to Art. L No, XVIII. 



only of an individual. The last to which I shall direct yout 

 attention is of much more serious importance, as it is directed 

 against the reputation of a scientific Institution, flourishing 

 under the high patronage and unmingled approbation of the 

 public. This writer has the temerity to charge the Zoolo- 

 gical Society with illiberality ; and he denounces it as being 

 in this respect far behind all similar institutions whether of 

 France or England. This charge I shall examine, first, ac- 

 cording to Mr. Swainson's own statement of the case ; and, 

 secondly, according to the facts, the official facts, which ex- 

 hibit it in its proper light. 



' ** Not being a member," says the complainant, " we were 

 'prohibited from making any effectual use of the Zoological 

 Society's museum, while engaged on the ornithological por- 

 tion of a national work, Dr. Richardson's Northern Zoology. 

 We, therefore," — what did we, therefore^ do in this distress- 

 ing embarrassment ? Become a member, and thus quietly sur- 

 mount the impediment to our wishes ? No, Sir ; that would 

 have been the plain and legitimate conclusion at which any 

 single-minded man would have arrived, who did not study his 

 logic in the same school as Mr. Swainson. No, Sir ; "we, 

 therefore^ went to Paris ! " There the accuser goes on to 

 state his having met with that courtesy and assistance in his 

 studies which every naturalist, as we well know, expects to 

 find, and is never disappointed in finding, in the public 

 institutions of that city. Now, Sir, if I can at all ascertain 

 the meaning of this logician (which, indeed, is no easy task, 

 while he deals in such extraordinary non sequiturs), the illi- 

 berality of which he would complain consists in the law 

 which limits the privileges of the Zoological Society to its 

 members ; while, on the other hand, the liberality which he 

 commends in the French institutions consists in the law that 

 opens their privileges to the public. The two cases, never- 

 theless, although at first sight apparently dissimilar, are 

 precisely the same. Both institutions equally confer their 

 privileges on those who respectively support them ; the mem- 

 bers of the London society providing the funds that are 

 indispensable for its maintenance, the public purse supplying 

 similar funds to the Parisian establishments. There is, there- 

 fore, no more liberality on one side of the Channel than on 

 the other ; the regulations on both sides being in principle 

 and in spirit the same. If there is any illiberality in the 

 present case, it attaches to him who admits that he would 

 not support an institution, the benefits of which he would at 

 the same time gratuitously appropriate to himself. If, indeed, 

 there is any class of persons on whom it is generally supposed 



