MEMOIR OF PENNANT. 39 



necessary consequence, from having chosen the form 

 of a journal for his Tours, and of following the 

 country and incidents as they actually occurred. 

 Straggling facts, suggested hy the district, are per- 

 haps too often introduced. 



His works on Natural History were much valued 

 at the time of their publication, and contained the 

 greater part of the knowledge of the times, upon 

 the subjects of which they treated. The value in 

 which they were held abroad was seen in the trans- 

 lations which appeared in various countries; and 

 the British and Arctic Zoologies are universally con- 

 sulted and referred to in the publications of the pre- 

 sent day. Though there is much in these volumi- 

 nous writings that has been superseded by more 

 recent discoveries, still they contain a great deai 

 of curious and interesting information; and, per- 

 haps, as they are now but rarely to be met with, 

 except in public libraries, we may do an act of 

 justice to the memory of Pennant, as well as confer 

 a favour on our readers, by selecting a few extracts 

 as an appropriate accompaniment to the preceding 

 sketch. In the first volume of his Arctic Zoology, 

 he gives a truly picturesque description of the mode 

 of taking eggs and sea-fowl, as practised in some of 

 the Orkney and other neighbouring islands. 



" Multitudes of the inhabitants of each cluster 

 of islands feed, during the season, on the eggs of 

 the birds of the cliffs. The method of taking them 

 is so very hazardous, as to satisfy us of the ex- 



