Vill The Naturalist in Nicaragua 
unassuming and even-tempered, he was only roused to 
anger by acts of oppression or wanton cruelty. Then his 
indignation, though not loud, was very real, and he acted 
with a promptitude which would hardly have been ex- 
pected from his usually placid demeanour. A story is told 
of how one day sitting at table he saw through the window 
a man belabouring a woman. Without saying a word, he 
rushed out, pinioned the offender by the elbows and, 
running him to the top of a steep slope in the street, gave 
him a kick which sent him flying down the declivity. The 
incident is recalled merely as an illustration of his practical 
way of dealing with difficulties which stood him in good 
stead in many an out-of-the-way corner of the world when 
contending with obstacles caused either by the perversity 
of man or the forces of nature. He never carried fire-arms 
even when travelling in the most unsettled districts, and 
his firm but conciliatory manner overcame opposition in a 
wonderful way. In ordinary life he was the kindest and 
most considerate of men, and his transparent sincerity 
made friends for him everywhere. Nor was he ever happier 
than when assisting others in those pursuits which occupied 
his own leisure. 
The interesting question as to what led Belt to become a 
naturalist is difficult to answer. ‘‘ Environment’ nowa- 
days accounts for much, but none of his brothers—and all 
the family had a similar bringing-up—showed any inclina- 
tion for what with him became the ruling passion of his 
life. And yet, in a wider sense, “environment” had 
probably something to do with it. In the first half of the 
nineteenth century Newcastle could boast of a succession 
of field-naturalists. unequalled in the country—Joshua 
Alder and Albany Hancock, who wrote the monograph on 
British nudibranchiate mollusca for the Ray Society; 
William Hutton and John Thornhill, botanists; W. C. 
Hewitson, Dr. D. Embleton, and John Hancock, zoologists ; 
Thomas Athey and Richard Howse, paleontologists—these, 
and others like them, were enthusiastically at work collect- 
ing, observing, recording, classifying. Fresh discoveries 
were being made every day; what are now commonplace 
scientific truisms wore then all the charm of novelty; the 
secrets of nature were being unveiled, and modern science 
was entering upon an ever-extending kingdom. 
