IV PREFACE. 



Other Orders of British animal life seem, so far as our 

 pages are concerned, to excite small interest. We hope in 

 future volumes that this cannot be said. 



Another feature in 1901 has been a biographical element, or 

 what we may venture to style a commencement of " patris-tic 

 zoology." Thus we have had an appreciation of "Dante as a 

 Naturalist," and a most interesting paper on "Early Ornitholo- 

 gists," written, alas! by an old contributor whose valued com- 

 munications we shall never receive again. 



Everywhere Zoology is an advancing science. This year the 

 International Congress held its meeting at Berlin, while the 

 publication of books relating to animal life is ever on the increase ; 

 and, though much of this literature may be of a compilative de- 

 scription, and designed for "popular" uses, it still proves that 

 the reading public are not uninterested in the animal life around 

 them. On all sides Zoology receives a fresh support. It is no 

 longer the sluggard who is bid to study the way of the Ant, but 

 the philosopher, and even the politician. Evolution has received 

 its strongest credentials from Zoology, and Evolution is now a 

 force recognized as much in the life of the city as in that of the 

 fields. We can realize the past when the zoologist would be 

 considered a " crank " ; we well understand the modern equivalent 

 of estimating the science as a "hobby"; but it only remains for 

 zoologists to render it one of the factors in assisting to explain 

 the mysteries of our own existence ; and this may perhaps be 

 best achieved by the bionomical method of ' The Zoologist.' 



