2 .INTRODUCTION 



he have been pleased. It is in the certainty of this 

 assurance that the letters have been contributed which 

 herein appear. 



The present book is, then, of Lord Lilford as naturalist 

 as sportsman also, but primarily as naturalist revealed 

 in his own informal writings. Entrusted to the Editor's 

 hands with words whose very graciousness was their 

 command, it has been till now delayed ; yet a book of 

 this kind may gain, perhaps, not lose, in the perspective 

 that a few years give. Be this as it may, all pains bestowed 

 upon his task are but an imperfect measure of the Editor's 

 true admiration for and grateful memory of this most 

 charming of naturalists and kindest of friends. 



We should not visit him at Lilford till we have been 

 with him in the Mediterranean which was his inspiration, 

 or we shall miss the key to his later interests. 



For this reason are given parts of his old diaries when 

 abroad. The diaries were recorded on a yacht, the letters 

 were written with crippled fingers which scarce could hold a 

 pen. These strictly natural history extracts give necessarily 

 but an imperfect impression of how the letters really ran. 

 Though all spontaneous and unstudied, those who received 

 them used to think them something more than clear : they 

 seemed marked by a simple grace of diction which gave 

 them a distinction quite their own. 



Our duty has been to pass on to others a naturalist's 

 thought and work, and we have attempted nothing more. 

 Yet, as one looks again over these pages, one cannot 



