Periodical Works on Natural History. 302 



my task ; for, as the authors and editors alluded to are, for 

 the most part, naturalists of one class or another, I am sorry, 

 as a brother-naturalist, to be compelled to speak or think 

 unfavourably of any of the fraternity, of whom I would fain 

 wish to be able to entertain the same opinion as good old 

 Izaak Walton did of his brethren of the angle, that they are 

 all " very honest men." Thus far our way has proved tole- 

 rably smooth, and we have gone on pretty comfortably, with- 

 out much jostling and jolting ; now the face of the country 

 begins to assume a different appearance, and the journey 

 threatens to be more rough and disagreeable. I shall not be 

 deterred, however, from pursuing my course, in spite of all 

 difficulties and obstructions. The little, mean, paltry tricks, 

 of which some otherwise respectable editors are guilty, must 

 be exposed to view, and held up to merited reprobation. At 

 the commencement of a periodical work, the author usually 

 puts forth a prospectus, in which he states, among other par- 

 ticulars, his plan and object, the nature and probable extent 

 of the work, the number and style of the plates, whether 

 coloured or plain, the usual quantity of letterpress, the stated 

 intervals at which the numbers are to appear, and the price 

 of the work per number. Now, as it is on the faith of such 

 guarantee that the public have to depend, and by which they 

 are in great measure guided in making up their minds whether 

 to take the work or not, the author is bound, in common 

 honesty, strictly to adhere to the engagements which he has 

 thus voluntarily undertaken. If he fails to fulfil the promises 

 he has held out, his prospectus serves only as a decoy-duck 

 to entrap purchasers, and entice the unwary to their loss. I 

 pass over the great irregularity which occasionally takes place 

 in the appointed periods of publication ; because this, I am 

 aware, may be owing to circumstances over which the author 

 has little or no control: the printer may be dilatory and 

 unpunctual ; or the engraver or colourer overwhelmed with 

 a more than ordinary press of urgent business ; or twenty 

 accidents may occur. But when the irregularity is carried to 

 the extent we sometimes see it, the author himself is hardly 

 to be acquitted of all participation in the blame. The reduc- 

 tion of the number of plates in a fasciculus is a more grievous 

 charge. An author engages to give three, four, or six plates 

 (as the case may be), in each number, and at a certain price : 

 after a time, stimulated, perhaps, by the lucre of gain, he 

 thinks fit to make an alteration ; and, to put the best face on 

 things, this he does, either by adding one or more plates,, and, 

 at the sa7ne time, raising the price of each fasciculus out of due 

 proportion; or else by reducing the number of plates, and in- 



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