274? Retrospective Criticism. 



by personal introduction or by a written order; and such 

 introduction shall be free from all cost whatsoever. The 

 entree to be in force for one month, which time may be in- 

 definitely extended upon application to the committee." This 

 enables the stranger to see all the newspapers, pamphlets, 

 scientific journals, &c. ; and as, in point of fact, he is sur- 

 rounded by the books upon open shelves, there is, and must 

 be, free access to them : a few only, perhaps a dozen, being 

 very valuable, are in a case; but even these may be forth- 

 coming at a moment's notice, by an application to the clerk 

 or to the curator for a key ; and the former officer is always 

 upon the spot, near the entrance to the rooms. There are 

 upwards of five hundred persons who can make all these 

 advantages available to strangers, simply by an order upon a 

 scrap of paper; and, in fact, there are not less than a hundred 

 persons who daily frequent these rooms, either as subscribers 

 or with orders. Hence, Mr. Conway has been singularly 

 unfortunate in this matter. I perceive in the books various 

 notices of the visits of this gentleman and members of his 

 family; the last was on, I believe, the 24th of May, 1832. 

 Why did not the complainant hint to Mr. Stutchbury his 

 ' yearnings' to inspect the books? Our curator expended no 

 little time during this c lounge/ in pointing out to him every 

 thing which the museum contained worthy of notice; and 

 would not have confined himself * merely* to this, had Mr. 

 Conway expressed the slightest wish to visit the reading 

 rooms." 



The Gland on the Rump of Birds. (Vol. V. p. 412. 588., 

 Vol. VI. p. 159.) — " Adhuc sub judice." Still in court.— 

 Sir, I see, by the last Magazine (p. 159 — 162.), that we have 

 not as yet quite reached the bottom of the oil-gland on the 

 rump of birds. While the suit is still pending, I will take 

 the opportunity to say a word or two more on the subject. 



Nothing can be so detrimental, as oily substances, to the 

 minutely fine and downy texture of feathers. As soon as 

 such substances come in contact with any part of the web of 

 a feather, the appearance of that part is changed. Thus, the 

 fat of a wildfowl which you have just killed will escape 

 from a shot hole, and cause such damage to the under parts 

 of the surrounding plumage, that I should say it is next to 

 impossible to restore the original appearance of the feathers. 

 If a bird, after extracting the oily matter from its gland, 

 does really apply that matter to the feathers, surely the applied 

 matter would be more or less visible to our eye. Now, 

 during my inspection of the skins of birds, some thousands 

 have passed through my hands ; but I have never yet been 

 able to discover that any of the feathers had been smeared 



