56 GLAUCUS; OR, 
tation of luxury and flattery, with her heart pure 
and her mind occupied in a boudoir full of shells 
and fossils, flowers and sea-weeds; keeping her- 
self unspotted from the world, by considering the 
| lies of the field, how they grow. And therefore 
“it is that I hail with thankfulness every fresh book 
of Natural History, as a fresh boon to the young, 
a fresh help to those who have to educate them. 
The greatest difficulty in the way of beginners 
is (as in most things) how “to learn the art of 
learning.” They go out, search, find less than they 
expected, and give the subject up in disappoint- 
ment. It is good to begin, therefore, if possible, 
by playing the part of “jackal” to some practised 
naturalist, who will show the tyro where to look, 
what to look for, and, moreover, what it is that he 
has found; often no easy matter to discover. 
Forty years ago, during an autumn’s work of dead- 
leaf-searching in the Devon woods for poor old 
Dr. Turton, while he was writing his book on British 
land-shells, the present writer learnt more of the 
art of observing than he would have learnt in three 
