456 THE ECCENTRIC NATURALIST. 



long loose coat of yellow nankeen, much the worse of the many rubs it had 

 got in its time, and stained all over with the juice of plants, hung loosely 

 about him like a sac. A waistcoat of the same, with enormous pockets, 

 and buttoned up to the chin, reached below over a pair of tight panta- 

 loons, the lower parts of which were buttoned down to the ankles. His 

 beard was as long as I have known my own to be during some of my 

 peregrinations, and his lank black hair hung loosely over his shoulders. 

 His forehead was so broad and prominent that any tyro in phrenology 

 would instantly have pronounced it the residence of a mind of strong 

 powers. His words impressed an assurance of rigid truth, and as he di- 

 rected the conversation to the study of the natural sciences, I listened to 

 him with as much delight as Telemachus could have listened to Mentor. 

 He had come to visit me, he said, expressly for the purpose of seeing my 

 drawings, having been told that my representations of birds were accom- 

 panied with those of shrubs and plants, and he was desirous of knowing 

 whether I might chance to have in my collection any with which be was 

 unacquainted. I observed some degree of impatience in his request to be 

 allowed at once to see what I had. We returned to the house, when I 

 opened my portfolios and laid them before him. 



He chanced to turn over the drawing of a plant quite new to him. 

 After inspecting it closely, he shook his head, and told me no such plant 

 existed in nature ; — for, kind reader, M. de T. although a highly scienti- 

 fic man, was suspicious to a fault, and believed such plants only to exist 

 as he had himself seen, or such as, having been discovered of old, had, ac- 

 cording to Father Malebranche^s expression, acquired a " venerable 

 beard." I told my guest that the plant was common in the immediate 

 neighbourhood, and that I should shew it him on the morrow. " And 

 why to morrow, Mr Auduhon "^ let us go now." We did so, and on 

 reaching the bank of the river, I pointed to the plant. M. de T. I thought 

 had gone mad. He plucked the plants one after another, danced, hug- 

 ged me in his arms, and exultingly told me that he had got not merely a 

 new species, but a new genus. When we returned home, the naturalist 

 opened the bundle which he had brought on his back, and took out a 

 journal rendered water-proof by means of a leather case, together with a 

 small parcel of linen, examined the new plant, and wrote its description. 

 The examination of my drawings then went on. You would be pleased, 

 kind reader, to hear his criticisms, which were of the greatest advantage 



