436 STUDY OF NATURAL HISTORY. 



their chief attention to their own affairs, we are well 

 disposed to pass over with indulgence many of the 

 petty charges not yet substantiated. There is, never- 

 theless, one subject that has been put forth against 

 it, upon which, as being intimately connected with 

 natural history, we shall venture to touch. An, 

 impression has long existed among the naturalists 

 of this country, that their favourite science, although 

 not professedly, had been virtually excluded from 

 those to which, of late years, the Royal Society had 

 more especially restricted its patronage and en- 

 couragement ; and this implied understanding had 

 arisen from the institution of the Linnaean and, more 

 recently, of the Zoological Societies, both of which 

 were formed more particularly for the advancement 

 of the science of natural history. This impression has 

 been further strengthened, by the remarkable fact of 

 no instance having occurred, of late years, of the Cop- 

 ley or any other medals having been bestowed upon 

 any of our naturalists. It seems, however, that this 

 notion is altogether erroneous: for not only does a 

 recent volume of their Transactions contain a zoo- 

 logical paper ; but it is expressly stated by the 

 illustrious president, that " physiology, including the 

 natural history of organised beings," holds the second 

 rank in the scale of those sciences, for the promotion 

 of which the royal medals were granted. How 

 great, then, was the astonishment of all those who 

 can rightly appreciate the loftiness of that genius 

 which discovers a law of nature, to see that one of 

 the greatest names in the annals of modern zoology 

 was entirely overlooked in the late distribution of 

 these national medals; while, in order that one should 



