LITERARY STRUGGLES. I59 



with my portfolio under my arm, seeking to show my 

 drawings of flowers and insects. I get many praises, but 

 little employment. I have, however, obtained several 

 engagements, in private schools and families. I make 

 frequent visits to the British Museum, and am especially 

 studying the large mammals. I have made careful draw- 

 ings of the giraffe on the old staircase, and the hippopota- 

 mus and rhinoceros at its foot. The other day I met a 

 Chinaman offering a glazed box of Chinese insects, stuffed 

 as full as it could hold. I could not resist the extravagance 

 of buying it, as he wanted but a small sum for it. I have 

 thrown away all but a few of the choice lepidoptera, and 

 have made it quite air-tight." This treasure accompanied 

 him in all subsequent wanderings to the very end. 



On February 29, 1840, The Canadian Naturalist was 

 published, the first of the long series of my father's works. 

 It was very favourably received, and sold firmly, though 

 rather slowly. The form in which it was written was 

 somewhat unfortunate, for it consisted of a series of con- 

 versations between an imaginary father and son, *' during 

 successive walks, taken at the various seasons of the year, 

 so that it may be considered as in some degree a kind of 

 Canadian Naturalist's Calendar!' The presentment of 

 facts was by no means helped by the snip-snap of the 

 dialogue, and the supposed father was found most enter- 

 taining when he talked with least interruption from the 

 young inquirer. The book was adorned by a large number 

 of illustrations, engraved in a very refined and finished 

 manner on blocks drawn in most cases by the author 

 himself, and in all designed by him. In The Canadian 

 Naturalist, imperfect as it was as a final expression of 

 his peculiar genius, Philip Gosse opened out a new field of 

 literature. In the eighteenth century, amid the careless 

 pedantry of such zoologists as Pennant, had been heard 



