PREFACE. 



The beautiful sketches, under the title of " The Ram- 

 bles of a Naturalist," which first appeared in "The 

 Friend," a religious and literary weekly journal of this 

 city, were lately published collectively in Waldie's Select 

 Circulating Library, and being deemed worthy of still 

 further dissemination, they have been dressed in the 

 present garb, and thus offered to public patronage. 

 Though they were dashed off on the spur of the occa- 

 sion, they possess all the characteristic freshness and 

 vigour of the author's style, and were among the last ef- 

 fusions of his vigorous mind. They were written while 

 he was confined to the bed of sickness, from which he 

 was removed in a few weeks afterwards to the tomb 

 and the series consequently interrupted. The sale of 

 the present edition may contribute to more pious uses 

 than mere commercial profits. 





