DRURY. 



was a time when natural history had charms 

 superior to every other delight the world could 

 bestow. All the enjoyments and gratifications of 

 sense were not in my opinion to be placed in compe- 

 tition with it; and if any thing on earth could 

 convey a faint or distant idea of heavenly pleasure, 

 I think it must be that." Hence his ardent prosecu- 

 tion of the study, even when his circumstances were 

 least favourable to such an indulgence; and it is 

 easy to imagine with what gratification a mind so 

 constituted would exchange for a time, and when a 

 due and conscientious regard to his own interests 

 and those of his family permitted, the bustle and 

 anxieties of trade the turmoil and effervescence of 

 a great city the 



" Fumum et opes strepitumque Romae," 



for a tranquil retreat where he could give himself 

 up without restraint to pursuits so congenial to his 

 disposition. Moments such as these, snatched from 

 his usual occupation, he regarded as in a great mea- 

 sure repaying him for the care and trouble to which 

 the latter not unfrequently subjected him. 



Honourable testimony has been often borne by 

 the master spirits of the science, to the value of 

 Prury's exertions in its behalf, and the excellence 

 of the work to which so high a character has al- 

 ready been assigned. Linnaeus dedicated a species 

 of Cimex to Drury ; Fabricius, an American species 

 of Stenocorus^ as well as a Danish Tinea ; and our 

 own Kirby, in his Monograph of English Bees, after 



