THE WONDERS OF THE SHORE. 41 



believing that every pebble holds a treasure, 

 every bud a revelation ; making it a point of 

 conscience to pass over nothing through laziness 

 or hastiness, lest the vision once offered and 

 despised should be withdrawn; and looking at 

 every object as if he were never to behold it 

 again. 



Moreover, he must keep himself free from all 

 those perturbations of mind which not only 

 weaken energy, but darken and confuse the in- 

 ductive faculty ; from haste and laziness, from 

 melancholy, testiness, pride, and all the pas- 

 sions which make men sec only what they 

 wish to see. Of solemn and scrupulous rever- 

 ence for truth, of the habit of mind which re- 

 gards each fact and discovery not as our own 

 possession, but as the possession of its Creator, 

 independent of us, our tastes, our needs, or our 

 vainglory, we liardly need to speak ; for it is 

 the very essence of a naturalist's faculty, the 

 very tenure of Iiis existence: and without truth- 

 fulness, science would be as impossible now as 

 rhivalry would have been of old. 



And last, but not least, the perfect naturalist 

 should have in liiiii tiie very essence of true 

 chivalry, namely, self-devotion ; tb(! desire to 



