3902 Presidential Address, [Sess, 
such a “ wee, sleekit, cow’rin’, tim’rous beastie” as the common 
field-mouse, with whom he claimed to be its “ earth-born com- 
panion an’ fellow-mortal.” As he looked upon its “ wee bit 
housie,” cosy for the coming winter but ruined when the cruel 
coulter passed through it, he enunciated a humbling truth 
when, moralising, he said, “the best laid schemes o’ mice 
and men gang aft a-gley.” He saw deeper than most men 
into the “wee, modest, crimson-tipped flow’r” which we all 
know as the common daisy, or gowan, for he saw in its un- 
timely end that often, even before “the grass withereth” or 
“the flower fadeth,” in ordinary course, man—as in his own 
case—is soon cut off, even in his prime; for, again moralising, 
he says :-— 
“ Ev’n thou, who mourn’st the Daisy’s fate, 
That fate is thine—no distant date ; 
Stern Ruin’s ploughshare drives elate, 
Full on thy bloom ; 
Till crush’d beneath the furrow’s weight, 
Shall be thy doom !” 
It is here that a Society such as ours comes in to offer the 
kindly, sympathetic help and direction so much needed in 
guiding and interesting busy folk in the observations of Nature 
and in their attempts to read the lessons she longs to teach. 
Our winter sessional meetings, our summer field-excursions, 
and our indoor microscopical work, afford large and pleasant 
opportunity for that refreshing, invigorating, and elevating 
relaxation which we all need. The apparatus may be as 
complicated or as simple as we choose. One thing, however, 
that is absolutely necessary—assuming the sympathetic spirit 
of the true lover of nature—is an observant eye, aided, if need 
be, by a good field-glass. 
It is the living, growing animal and plant that should be 
studied, rather than the dead “specimen ”—the mere “mass 
of tissues and vessels, a stuffed skin or a skeleton ’—killed it 
may be from sheer wantonness or by one unworthy of the 
name of naturalist, only to fill “his private collection, and 
destroying for himself and others the possibility of observing 
and studying their life.” The true and reverent naturalist 
respects life,and would grant even “The Mouse’s Petition ” :— 
