INTRODUCTORY ESSAY. 



BY J. ARTHUR THOMSON. 



BREHM'S PLACE AMONG NATURALIST-TRAVELLERS. 



Though Brehm's lectures might well be left, as his son has said, 

 to speak for themselves, it seems useful to introduce them in their 

 English dress with some notes on the evolution of the naturalist- 

 traveller and on Brehm's place in the honourable list; for an adequate 

 appreciation of a book like this depends in part on a recognition 

 of the position it occupies among analogous works, and on having 

 some picture of the illustrious author himself. 



In sketching the history of the naturalist-traveller it is not 

 necessary to go very far back; for though it is interesting to recall 

 how men of old followed their migrating herds, as the Lapp or 

 Ostiak does his reindeer, and were led by them to fresh fields and 

 new conquests, or how others followed the salmon down the rivers 

 and became the toilers of the sea, this ancient lore is full of uncer- 

 tainty, and is, besides, of more moment to the sociologist than to the 

 naturalist. What we attempt here is merely to indicate the various 

 types of naturalist- traveller who have in the course of time succeeded 

 one another in the quest for the new. 



The foundations of zoology were laid by Aristotle some three 

 hundred years before Christ, but they remained unbuilt on for 

 nearly eighteen centuries. Here and there some enthusiast strove 

 unaided, but only a fragmentary superstructure was reared. In fact, 

 men were pre-occupied with tasks of civilization more serious than 

 the prosecution of zoology, though that is not trivial. Gradually, 



