ub, 



P K E F A C E 



; 



THE main object of this little book is to 

 enable the reader, unacquainted with Natural 

 History, to recognise some of the different 

 objects frequent on our shores. There is not 

 one of them all, but has some interesting cir- 

 cumstance connected with it, familiar enough 

 to the man of science, but never suspected by 

 those who have not had opportunity or incli- 

 nation to study them. Could we trace the 

 mental history of our great naturalists, we 

 should find that many who have devoted their 

 lives to the pursuits of science, had at first 

 their attention directed to it, like Linnaeus, by 

 listening to a conversation, or, like Sir Joseph 

 Banks, by musing, in a leisure moment, on 

 the beauty of a flower ; and thus the reading 

 of a little volume like this, on Common Things, 

 may serve to awaken an interest in nature, 

 which shall not sleep again. 



A2 



^ '5 



