74 THE REV. J. G. WOOD. 



even in " Trespassers," a book in which, perhaps, 

 almost more than in any other, he had a definite 

 idea to work out, and a definite ground to cover, 

 he abstains in the same marked manner from anything 

 approaching to a recapitulation of what he has said, 

 or to a summary of the principal points which he has 

 brought forward. The final paragraph is merely as fol- 

 lows: "Now as to the travelling ants, which are shown 

 in the illustration; these creatures act, when on the 

 march, just as soldiers when pushing their way to- 

 wards a battery ; they always keep themselves under 

 cover, and in a most extraordinary manner, and with 

 wonderful speed, build covered galleries, under the 

 shelter of .which they can proceed unmolested by the 

 unwelcome light." 



Yet, in his sketch-lectures, he was most careful 

 with his conclusion, and always had a few sentences 

 which took one back over the ground that he had 

 covered, and summed up the teaching of the whole. 

 So, too, in any speech that he made in public ; 

 the end was as carefully considered as the beginning. 

 Probably, therefore, the absence of peroration in his 

 writings was intentional; certainly it was character- 

 istic. 



In the same year in which " Homes without 

 Hands " appeared 1865 my father varied his literary 

 labours by undertaking the editorship of The Boys 

 Own Magazine. To this, for some years past, he had 

 been contributing a series of papers entitled " The 

 Zoological Gardens," in which most of the inmates 



