PREFACE 



THE present voldmeis, like its predecessors, "Science 

 from an Easy Chair" (Series I and Series II) and 

 " Diversions of a Naturalist " — mainly a revision and 

 reprint — with considerable additions — of articles published 

 in daily or weekly journals. The first chapter appeared 

 originally in « The Field." The Chapters VI, XX, XXI, 

 and XXII were published in the " Illustrated London 

 News," under the title " About a Number of Things." The 

 rest are some of the articles which, as " Science from an 

 Easy Chair," I contributed, during seven years, to the 

 " Daily Telegraph." That, to me very happy, conjunction 

 was, like so many other happy things, necessarily inter- 

 rupted by the Great War. 



One result of that terrible cataclysm is that not a few 

 thoughtful writers have been led to deny the existence of 

 what they call " Progress," meaning by that word the 

 development of mankind from a less to a more complete 

 attainment of moral and physical well-being. The 

 question raised is obscured by the arbitrary use of the 

 word " progress," since by it any movement from point 

 to point — whether advantageous and desirable or the 

 reverse — is described, as, for instance, in the familiar titles 

 given by Bunyan to his book " The Pilgrim's Progress " 

 and by Hogarth to his pictures "The Rake's Progress," 

 b 



