PREFACE ix 



may be mentioned the establishment of a Professorship of this 

 subject by the University of Oxford. 



4. The short sketches of some of the personal character- 

 istics of the contemporary naturalists of our country who 

 have been most prominent in advancing the branches of 

 science to which the essays of the first three sections are 

 devoted form a not unnatural sequel to them. 



In conclusion, my best thanks are offered to the various 

 institutions and persons who have kindly given permission for 

 the republication of the essays, the source of which is in 

 every case acknowledged ; but I may especially mention the 

 Council of the Eoyal Society in respect to the biographical 

 notices from their Proceedings ; the Council of the British 

 Association for the Advancement of Science, for various addresses 

 published in the reports of their meetings ; the Council of the 

 Koyal Institution and of the Eoyal Colonial Institute, for 

 lectures given before them and published in their Proceedings ; 

 the proprietors of the North American Review and of Chamber s's 

 Journal, for articles contributed originally to those periodicals ; 

 and Messrs. A. and C. Black and Messrs. Macmillan and Co. 

 Ltd., for illustrations of the articles on " Whales," and on 

 " Fashion in Deformity." 



W. H. F. 



26 STANHOPE GARDENS, LONDON, 

 Easter 1898. 



