IV PREFACE. 



number of our readers, that we have in this Third Volume brought 

 to a conclusion most of our Introductions to the different branches 

 of Natural History, originally intended to be continued through 

 several volumes. In every other respect we have adhered to our 

 prospectus ; and we hope to go on in the same course for many 

 years to come, gathering strength as we proceed ; and so rooting 

 this periodical into the literature of the country, as that there 

 must always in future be in these islands a Magazine of Natural 

 History. 



With the present Volume is given a Glossarial Index to the 

 technical terms made use of from the commencement of the work 

 up to the present time, with references to the pages where will 

 be found their explanations at length, and their application to the 

 different departments of natural science. As the first step to- 

 wards the knowledge of the nature of things, and to the commu- 

 nication of that knowledge to others, is to know their names ; so 

 we would earnestly recommend to our young readers, or generally 

 to all those who feel that they are not yet beyond the age of 

 acquiring new ideas, to study this Glossary word by word. We 

 would recommend them to turn to every page referred to, so as 

 not only completely to understand the word and its application, 

 but to impress on the understanding and the memory the subject 

 in the discussion of which the application is made. This will be 

 to master a part of every branch of Natural History, and to make 

 the Magazine, as far as it has hitherto proceeded, the reader's 

 own. The ideas communicated to the world in this Magazine 

 proceed from the minds of some hundreds of individuals, all 

 directed to the same subject; they are, therefore, much more 

 worthy of being fixed in the memory than those of any one 

 individual ; for example, in a single treatise. This is a proposition 

 which will bear discussion at length ; but we must leave it for 

 the present, and conclude by hinting that those who peruse a 

 scientific magazine, as they would glance over a merely literary 

 periodical, are spending their time to very little purpose. 



J. C. L. 



Bayswatevy Oct. 18. 1830. 



