8 Charles Darwin. 



in his memoir on the Flustra, in which our young 

 naturalist saw his name for the first time in print. 

 Dr. Grant introduced him to many persons interested 

 in science, and invited him to the meetings of the 

 Royal Medical Society, where, according to Darwin, 

 " much rubbish was talked." Dr. Grant also took 

 him to the Wernerian Society, where he listened to 

 Audubon, who was then in Europe in the interests 

 of his great work on birds, and who read several 

 papers before the Society. These days were rich in 

 future promise for the young student, all his associa- 

 tions being such as to increase his interest in science. 

 He enlarged his acquaintance on all sides, took les- 

 sons in taxidermy, with a man who had travelled 

 with Waterton, and with Mr. Leonard Horner visited 

 the Royal Society of Edinburgh, where he listened 

 to Sir Walter Scott, who was at that time its presi- 

 dent. The proceedings produced a profound im- 

 pression, shown by his statement in later years : " If 

 I had been told at that time that I should one day 

 have been thus honoured (with membership), I 

 should have thought it as ridiculous and improb- 

 able, as if I had been told that I should be elected 

 King of England." 



Darwin's taste for science was supplemented by a 

 course of studies, and in his second year he attended 

 a series of lectures on geology and zoology, those in 

 the former making a decided impression upon him, 

 as he says : '' The sole effect they produced on me 

 was the determination never, as long as I lived, to 

 read a book on geology." In other words, the 

 lecturer had the unhappy faculty of making sub- 



