True Old Age. 205 



true old age, and that which we should set ourselves to 

 attain. Our first duty is to live as long as we can ; and 

 our chief wisdom, after the fear of God, is to cultivate 

 those tastes which make youth of spirit last till birthdays 

 come no more. The actual longevity both of naturalists 

 in general, and of many of the Lancashire men in par- 

 ticular, is a fact of no mean significance. Crowther was 

 seventy-nine when he died; John Mellor, eighty-two; 

 Elias Hall, the geologist, eighty-nine. Timothy Harrop, 

 of Middleton, with whose work, as a bird and animal 

 stuffer, the British Association were so well pleased when 

 they visited Manchester in 1842; and Josiah Nuttall, of 

 Heywood, were also very old men. Whether this 

 longevity is to be attributed to the quiet and temperate 

 habits which the study of natural history almost invariably 

 induces, or to the continual out-door exercise inseparable 

 from genuine pursuit of it; or to the quickening of the 

 intelligence and affections, and the invigoration of the 

 bodily health, which, by a beautiful law of nature, always 

 so gratefully ensues; there is evidently a something 

 about natural history other circumstances being equal 

 wonderfully promotive of length of days. Men never 

 step into the presence of nature with affection and 

 reverence, but they come back blessed and strengthened 

 with a reward. 



Let us now look a little more closely at the individuals. 

 The lives of some of them are before the world, told in 

 those interesting, though "short and simple annals," 

 which have appeared in the local press from time to time, 



