I82 



THE MUSEUM 



and fame the same retiring, modest, 

 and thoroughly unspoiled man that he 

 had been when he went away, tells us 

 of the wonderful amount of work that 

 he did for pure science in a manner 

 that is as direct and unassuming as 

 though he was narrating the most or- 

 dinary matters. Whymper, after 219 

 days and nights in such inhospitable 

 and dangerous elevations as only the 

 Andean explorer can appreciate, comes 

 back to civilization so impressed with 

 the importance of comparing his work 

 with that already done by others, that 

 nine years pass by before he considers 

 it time to give to the world the facts 

 of his explorations in the Equadorean 

 Andes. Wallace spent many of the 

 best years of his life in researches that 

 have given the world some of the most 

 brilliant theories concerning the animal 

 and vegetable kingdoms that have ever 

 been brought forth, and at the same 

 time was busy in gathering a vast store 

 of facts that have been a perfect well- 

 spring from which the botanists and 

 zoologists of all Christendom have 

 drawn many of their choicest material. 

 It is the explorer who explores who is 

 wanted to-day and who has always be- 

 fore him the assurance that his work 

 will be appreciated where appreciation 

 is worth the having. 



But, I hear some of my readers say, 

 how do you expect us to go away from 

 home and parents and school and copy 

 the achievements of these men who 

 thus spent years away from civiliza- 

 tion.' To which I reply that there is 

 another sort of explorer who is quite as 

 worthy of emulation as these of whom 

 I have last spoken. To this class be- 

 long such names as White, who, around 

 his home at Selbourne, did so much 

 toward unraveling the secrets of nature 

 that there presented themselves to him. 

 And again, we have our own Thoreau, 

 to whom the simple cabin life in a 

 New England woods was of greater 

 charm than the brilliant society that 

 he was sure to meet in his own home, 

 because, as he tells us, the dwellers in 

 that woods — the squirrels, the birds, 



the reptiles and the insects — were to 

 him worthier of study and more profit- 

 able as companions than their more 

 pretentious relative, man. And to- 

 day we have our Borroughs and our 

 Abbott, letting no chance slip by them 

 to see more of nature, not as she is to 

 be seen in the bleak north or the swel- 

 tering south, but just as she is and is 

 so little understood here at home, and 

 telling us of their discoveries as no 

 others can. I speak of these at-home 

 explorers in this way because I take it 

 for granted that all my readers are ac- 

 quainted with their writings, and, that 

 if some there be who are not, they will 

 quickly remedy the defect — for defect 

 it is. 



So when I speaK of the work that 

 awaits young explorers — and it is a 

 very important work of which I am 

 writing, if it be well done — I mean ex- 

 ploration around home. There is no 

 need to shrug the shoulders in the feel- 

 ing that around your home there can- 

 not be yet remaining that which is un- 

 discovered, for it is quite safe to say 

 that in the most thickly settled neigh- 

 borhoods in our lands there is more to 

 find out and to communicate for the 

 good of science than has yet been dis- 

 covered about the region. 



Everywhere, even in our thickly set- 

 tled eastern states, there are many 

 curious, and even wonderrul things, 

 that have never been noticed by peo- 

 ple of intelligence, and consequently 

 remain undescribed. 



It is of just this sort of exploration 

 that I am writing, and of the impor- 

 tance of which I wish to convince my 

 readers 



Though not so enticing to many, the 

 explorations that have to do with the 

 animal and vegetable life of any given 

 region are by no means of the least im- 

 portance. Setting aside the mere hunt 

 after the plants or the animals that are 

 valuable in medicine or the arts as not 

 so likely to be of value in our land, 

 and as a least noble sort of exploration 

 at the best, let us consider the kind of 

 inquiry into our immediate neighbor- 



