1861.] ARENARIA BALEARICA. 57 



The fact was significant, and it may now be left to the discre- 

 tion of our readers to decide whether it was more significant of 

 the mala fides, the faithlessness, of the Editor, or of the malus 

 animus of its discoverer. 



The senseless twittle-twattle contained in the last paragraph 

 of this impertinent curiosity is as singular and as rare a speci- 

 men of harmless invective as it is of human imbecility. The 

 would-be ratiocinative author contradicts himself, and inno- 

 cently gives an answer to his own cavil. That it is utterly 

 without meaning I will not assert, for its intention evidently 

 was to hurt one who had never wronged him either by word or 

 deed. The animus of the period is plain as a pike-staff, but it is 

 like the feckless dart of the aged, feeble Priam, on the shield of 

 the armed, Avarlike son of Achilles, — it only recoils on the 

 thrower. It is as defective in moral dignity as it is in gram- 

 matical structure and logical deduction. It is, on the whole, 

 just such an efiusion as might originate in a mind clouded and 

 darkened by the fumes of the incense of flattery burnt under 

 the nostrils of one greedy of praise, or on the altar erected to 

 self-idolatry. 



Where is the causal reasoning, the philosophical inference, or 

 logical definition, in the last paragraph of this pitiful exhibition 

 of petty spitefulness, p. 40. 



Courteous reader, be so good as to compare these two quota- 

 tions, which are submitted to thy candid consideration :— 



Mr. W. writes, " I cannot place scientific reliance" — (what is 

 scientific reliance?) — " upon Mr. Sim's reports or (nor) upon the 

 phytological records of them." Or, in plainer terms, that fact 

 was no fact, but a figment of Mr. Sim's invention, and the 

 phytological record of them is to be placed in the same cate- 

 gory. This is most emphatically denied, and the accuser is 

 hereby challenged to prove what he has asserted. Again : " It 

 would be most unfair not to disclaim any insinuation against 

 Mr. Sim personally, on the score of moral truthfulness." Look 

 on that, and look on this. I cannot believe him, says Mr. 

 Watson, and yet on the score of moral truthfulness he is unim- 

 peachable ! " Nescio quo teneam Proteu." 



Surely this is a pregnant example of the effect of " addiction 

 to psychological studies" on the student himself, in qualifying 

 him for a discoverer and a teacher of truth. 



N. S, VOL, V. I 



