Ixiv 



notes of captures near Newcastle, York, &c., of butterflies and 

 moths. The tendency of his mind then — as throughout his life — 

 was rather in the direction of the artistic enjoyment of natural 

 objects than then- intellectual study, and of aesthetic qualities it 

 was colom* much more than form which attracted him. This 

 peculiarity of mental character, if we apprehend it rightly, 

 furnishes the key to the appreciation of all his subsequent work, 

 its merits and its deficiencies. With such inclinations, it is 

 natural that he should have been attracted in his youth by the 

 beauty of birds' eggs, and have employed his great artistic skill 

 in figming them. Thus, his fu'st published work was the well- 

 known ' Coloured Illustrations of the Eggs of British Birds,' 

 of which the first part appeared in April, 1831, and which has 

 maintained its hold on public favour ever since, and reached the 

 honom'S of a third edition. 



At this time Mr. Hewitson was a poor man, following his 

 profession of Surveyor, in the course of which he was employed 

 in surveying portions of the lines of some of our great railways 

 then in course of construction. Successive bequests by deceased 

 opulent relatives gradually improved his position, and enabled 

 him to indulge freely his now confirmed passion for the Dim'nal 

 Lepidoptera. In 1844 he visited Switzerland and made a collec- 

 tion of Alpine butterflies, an account of his captures of which 

 appeared in the ' Zoologist' for 1845. Soon after he took up his 

 residence at Hampstead, in order to be near the metropolis, and 

 entered ardently into the formation of a collection of exotic 

 butterflies. Henceforward he became a considerable pm'chaser 

 of specimens from all parts of the world, and to the same extent 

 contributed to the encouragement of the many Natural History 

 expeditions, to various countries, which from this epoch rapidly 

 succeeded each other. Thus he helped, with others, to render 

 the scientific voyages of Dyson to Honduras and Venezuela 

 possible in 1845 — 7, and afterwards those of Mr. Wallace and 

 myself, commencing in 1848 and extending over a series of years. 

 But it must be recorded that at the commencement his assistance 

 was but sparingly rendered, and that it was only in the later 

 years of his life that he sent out travellers at his own cost, and 

 received as a .reward of his munificence those splendid series of 

 new and beautiful species which rendered his collection famous, 

 and which, but for his enterprise, might have till now remained 



