44 INTRODUCTION. 



health and nowise disabled. It might not be easy to 

 do this again ; and some accidental circumstance, 

 besides patience on our part, might have favoured 

 the success which attended the experiment in this 

 instance ; but certainly without patience, it would 

 have been altogether impracticable ; and we mention 

 it in order to show, how it is possible gradually to 

 habituate animals to the appearance of man, just as 

 we know birds get in time habituated, as the farmer 

 is too well aware, to the scare-crow in the fields. 



(27.) There is but one hint further, which we 

 would suggest in addition to those which have been 

 already given; and that is, a recommendation to 

 observers to visit the same spots repeatedly, espe- 

 cially at different periods of the year. To those 

 whose situation and circumstances necessarily limit 

 their researches to a small field, it will be an en- 

 couragement to be told of the fruits that may be 

 gathered from attending to this plan. Having once 

 gone over the ground, or visited it perhaps a second 

 season, and gleaned nothing from it which they had 

 not observed before, they might be inclined to think 

 their task done, or rather we should say, their 

 amusement ended. But we assure them this is not 

 the case. We advise them to return again and 

 again to the same localities, and this at all seasons ; 

 and we feel assured they will find in the end their 

 trouble repaid by the discovery of some new fact, 

 their curiosity further stimulated. To those who 

 are collecting materials for a Fauna or Flora of 

 any district, it is notorious, not only what a con- 

 stant succession of different species are to be found 



