PRELIMINARY NOTICES. 



no wish to see him in Iiis nakedness ; but of this I am sure, that 

 he is neither a judge of my work, nor of the science of which 

 it treats. 



In conclusion, and not to weary you with a long letter, let 

 me entreat you, sir, for tiie future, to exercise your discretion 

 as an Editor, and refuse such trash offered to you as criticism, 

 or disavow your connexion with such a periodical,— your fame 

 and credit will not be improved by the alliance. 

 I am, sir, 

 With much respect, your most obedient humble servant 



JAS. JENNINGS. 



p.s. You will observe, sir, a few of the public testimonies to 

 the value of my work on the following page. I could adf?uce 

 many letters from some of the first naturalists of tiie age, and 

 fellows of the Linnean Society, to whom I am person;. lly 

 unknown, who have voluntarily and unsolicitedly expressed their 

 approbation of it ; but such gratifying communications I have, 

 of course, no right to make public. 



To conclude this lly per criticism, what a deliglilful book 

 wouIdOrm'/Ao/oo/a have been, had not the author introduced 

 the subject of Humanitj/ to Animals ; how pleasant could 

 lie have made it, had he eulogized, as is the fashion, Isaac 

 Walton and other piscatory writers; how would our lite- 

 rary gourmands have gloated over whole pages of inanities, 

 so that he bad left them to the enjoyment oi \he\r pleasures. 

 More especially if he had written in praise of the Pleasures 

 of the Chace ; of the destruction of Grouse and Partridges ; 

 of the exhilaration produced by the cry of the loud mouthed 

 hounds ; or by the flash of Manton's riflo, on a frosty morn- 

 ing in October. But no, he has not chosen to do this, 

 and verily he hath his reward, — the silly criticism of the 

 London and the Neio Monthly Magazines, and the vitupe- 

 ration of the ignorant and the unfeeling. 



London; September 1829. 



