SOME EARLY BRITISH ORNITHOLOGISTS. 261 



" Ornithology of Francis Willughby," early developed 

 a " taste for that study, and incidentally a love for that 

 of natural history in general, which I have since pursued 

 with my constitutional ardor." Pennant began the first 

 of his many " Tours," his accounts of which from their 

 topographical interest are more read at the present day 

 than his other writings, from Oxford in 1747. His first 

 literary work, an extract from a letter written to his uncle, 

 James Mytton, concerning an earthquake at Downing 

 in 1750, appears in the 10th volume of the " Abridgement 

 of the Philosophical Transactions," and thenceforward 

 his active pen knew no rest until the time of his death, 

 when he was engaged on an ambitious work entitled 

 " Outlines of the Globe," of which he had projected some 

 fifteen quarto volumes, only four of which would seem 

 to have been published. It is here only possible to deal 

 with a few of the zoological books of this prolific author, 

 but it may afford some idea of the vast output of his 

 writings if we mention that the number of plates engraved 

 for his several works totals no less than eight hundred 

 and two (c/. Literary Life, p. 38). In 1755 Pennant 

 commenced a correspondence with the great Linnaeus, 

 and in 1757, as he tells us, received " the first and greatest 

 of my Literary honors," being elected " at the instance 

 of Linnaeus himself," a member of the Royal Society of 

 Upsal. In 1761 Pennant began to pubhsh his " British 

 Zoology," which, when completed in 1776, contained 

 one hundred and thirty-two coloured plates, engraved 

 by Peter Mazel, and coloured by Peter Pallou, " an 

 excellent artist, but too fond of giving gaudy colours to 

 his subjects." This work which, as Pennant himself 

 observes, would have been more useful in quarto size, 

 he produced chiefly at his own expense, devoting the 

 proceeds to the " benefit of the Welch Charity-School on 

 Clerkenwell Green " (c/. adv. to the second edition of 

 The British Zoology, 1768). The publication of the 

 first edition of the " British Zoology " had been delaj^-ed 

 by a journey, which Pennant made to the continent in 



