4 Naturalist at Large 



moderate and puny compared to what I often observe and 

 hear about in others. 



Now in the Museum all is different. My staff does not 

 laugh at my jack-of -all-trades inclinations. They might, 

 for I have collected and described mammals, birds, rep- 

 tiles, amphibians, fishes, and have collected countless in- 

 sects and marine invertebrates which others have described. 

 I have been by inclination an old-fashioned naturalist, many 

 tell me perhaps the last of the breed. My colleagues prefer 

 to know more and more about less and less and so are in- 

 finitely more erudite than I. 



No man has ever had more fun with his chosen tasks. 

 When I am taxed with, "You never do anything that you 

 don't want to do," my answer is, "Not if I can help it." 

 Father, bless him, left me well endowed with this world's 

 goods and with a nervous, high-strung desire to hurry 

 about whatever I am attempting to do. This has been my 

 chief source of strength — and perhaps of weakness, too. 

 I have loved the three Museums in Boston, Cambridge, and 

 Salem, which, from time to time, I have been permitted to 

 correct as if they were human friends. 



I do not think I am guilty of conceit, as was Rafinesque. 

 He wrote at the close of his autobiography: — 



Versatility of talents and of professions, is not un- 

 common in America; but those which I have exhibited 

 in these few pages, may appear to exceed belief: and 

 yet it is a positive fact that in knowledge I have been a 

 Botanist, Naturalist, Geologist, Geographer, Histo- 

 rian, Poet, Philosopher, Philologist, Economist, Phi- 

 lanthropist. ... By profession a Traveller, Mer- 



