PREFACE. 



little volume of Natural History 

 sketches has very little to do with 

 opinions or speculations. The aim of 

 the writer has been to describe the facts and 

 phenomena of Nature as they have appeared to 

 present themselves to his own observation. They 

 are life-pictures rather than compilations. So far 

 as systematic arrangement is concerned, there has 

 certainly been an effort to treat each subject 

 taken up in such a way as to lay at least a 

 stepping-stone on the path to a more serious 

 contemplation of the sciences of the text-book 

 and the laboratory, but the primary intention of 

 the author has been rather to awaken or to 

 stimulate a love for Nature in the minds of 

 some who may not as yet have suspected what 

 wondrous and ever-varying beauty lies everywhere 

 about us in ditch and pond, in rock and stone, 

 in river and sea, on earth and in the skies. 



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