264 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



whether we might not find genius and originality in other races of ani- 

 mals which would throw as much light upon the genius and originality 

 of man as the eccentricities of this pigeon seem to throw on the eccen- 

 tricities of a most active and confident school of modern thought ? If 

 John Stuart Mill were right in thinking it a sacred duty not to dis- 

 courage the milder lunacies of human beings, might we not with equal 

 advantage extend his exhortation, and make it include the duty of pro- 

 tecting the independent development of the idiosyncrasies of bird and 

 beast, in the hope of finding in them some clew to the various oddities 

 and harmless insanities of human thought and action ? — Spectator, 



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BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH OF E. B. TYLOR. 



AMONG the most prominent of the British scientists, attracted to 

 the recent meeting at Montreal, was the President of the An- 

 thropological Section, Edward Burnett Tylor. He is well known as 

 a distinguished author on the early history of the races of mankind, and 

 his investigations of this comprehensive subject entitle him to an emi- 

 nent rank among the founders of the recently established science of 

 anthropology. 



He was born at Camberwell, about four miles from St. Paul's 

 Cathedral, London, on October 2, 1832. He was of Quaker parentage, 

 and was educated principally at the school of the Society of Friends, 

 Grove House, Tottenham. He was a fair classical scholar, and had 

 mastered the differential calculus, when at sixteen he entered his 

 father's manufactory in London, with the intention of pursuing a busi- 

 ness career. But at twenty, soon after the death of his father and 

 mother, symptoms of consumption, or what became dangerous symp- 

 toms, appeared. He then traveled in the United States and Mexico 

 for two years to recruit his health. On his return to England he had 

 a severe attack of phthisis, and his case was several times declared 

 hopeless by eminent physicians, but, after spending several winters 

 on the Riviera, he partially recovered. He was then advised that 

 he might marry, and this completed his restoration, his wife tak- 

 ing excellent care of his health. He is now a strong, broad-chested 

 man, six feet high, in the full enjoyment of mental and bodily 

 vigor. 



Dr. Tylor was not a university man, and the circumstances which 

 turned his attention to the department of knowledge to which he has 

 devoted himself and the influences by which he was impelled to pursue 

 it are interesting. He entered into scientific life under unusual advan- 

 tages, having the opportunity of meeting many eminent scientific men 



