166 The Malay ArcMjpelago. [April, 



even by name, to laugli with him at the mute astonishment of his 

 savage acquaintances as he follows his scientific pursuits, or at him 

 as he practises a little of that hterary archery in which all travellers 

 are supposed to excel. 



The life of such a man in many senses resembles our own, but 

 he experiences greater extremes of physical enjoyment and priva- 

 tion, of mental suffering and delight ; and one of his chief advantages 

 over us is the lasting pleasure which must remain when he retiu'ns 

 to civihzed life and subsides into the useful member of a family, the 

 occupant of a cherished home. Then the remembrance of his exciting 

 dangers abroad must afford him as much satisfaction as that of his 

 most enjoyable hours. As he walks through the market, and his 

 glance falls upon a troj^ical fruit, his mind must wander back to the 

 virgin forest where he plucked it fresh and luscious from the tree ; 

 or as he inspects the treasures of some modest museum, and a rare 

 creature, of which nothing but the skin is a reality, meets his eye, 

 he starts for an instant, as he remembers with what surprise he first 

 saw tliat form, here inanimate and perhaps disfigured by the dust of 

 years, spring past him instinct with life as he wandered along the 

 forest path, and disappear in the jungle before he had time even to 

 raise his fowhng-piece or rifle. Under the shade full of birds 

 standing on the chimneypiece of some labourer's cottage, he espies 

 in every httle bright-winged creature a reminiscence of some new 

 locality which he visited in times gone by ; and whilst we should 

 associate such objects with the auction mart, and estimate how many 

 shilliags the collection may have cost, he sees, perhaps, in one of the 

 little feathered forms alone, the type of one which necessitated a 

 whole day's pursuit and an unusual expenditure of his limited 

 means. How thankful should we be to those enterprising and 

 adventurous traders who bring into our parlours, boudoirs, and 

 cottages the rarest and loveliest productions of tropical climes, and 

 enable us to possess them for an outlay in some cases less than is 

 requisite to obtain them where they are produced by nature.* 



Nor must it be supposed that the roving uaturahst passes 

 through one continued series of privations all the year round, or 

 lives in clover only when his gun supplies him with a superabund- 

 ance of game ; where he wanders, ci\'ilized men are often few and 

 far between, and wherever the traveller appears, he brings to the 

 colonist, what is more precious than gold or jewels, the souud of a 

 cultivated voice, the recollection of home and fi-iends far away ; and 

 no wonder that he is now and then a little petted and spoiled. 



Mr. Wallace thus describes his life in Celebes : t — 



* Mr. Wallace tells us (vol. i., p. 47.^) that " numbers of the handsome but very 

 common cones, cowries, and olives " (shells) " sold in the streets of London for a 

 penny each" are natives of Amboyna, "where thoy cannot be bought so cheaply." 



t Wallace, vol. i., pp. 3G2-3. 



