GOLDSMITH AS A NATURALIST. 381 



if he had quoted fewer authorities, and those more judiciously. 

 The whole eight volumes are interspersed with many very absurd 

 stories about beasts and birds, which his innate simplicity led 

 him half to believe. I will mention a few. Quoting, I believe, 

 Linnasus, he says that a Squirrel, when it wants to cross a river, 

 finds a piece of bark, sets it afloat, and goes aboard ; it reaches 

 the other side by using its tail like a fan or windmill ! Imagine 

 this timid, unobtrusive creature, with the cunning of a Monkey, 

 watching its anchored " bark " as it waits for a flood-tide or a 

 favourable wind. 



We are informed, too, that the Albatross, on flying to an im- 

 mense height, tucks its head under one wing, and keeps afloat by 

 flapping the other ; thus it roosts. "What truth there maybe 

 in this statement I will not take upon me to determine " is his 

 comment. 



Goldsmith was quite aware of his ignorance of the natural 

 sciences, and he makes no attempt to hide it (for, in spite 

 of his vanity, he was unwilling apparently to assume an affec- 

 tation of great learning) ; but, nevertheless, the fear he shows 

 of passing decisive opinions, even on such fables as these, is 

 ridiculous. 



A certain few Nightingales are related as being so clever that 

 they could talk like Parrots, and tell each other tales. " Such 

 is the sagacity ascribed to the Nightingale." Would that they 

 had lent a little of this superfluous quality to the credulous 

 author ! 



These wondrous stories are at all events amusing, and Dr. 

 Johnson prophetically remarked, " He is now writing a Natural 

 History, and he will make it as interesting as a Persian tale." 

 But the extravagant imageries of a Persian tale would not go to 

 form an ideal history of animated nature. The book might have 

 been even more fanciful, for in the preface Goldsmith writes that, 

 before he had read the works of the great French scientist Buffon, 

 it was his intention to treat what he then conceived to be an 

 idle subject "in an idle manner"; for let us "dignify Natural 

 History," he says, "with the grave appellation of an useful 

 science, yet still we must confess that it is the occupation 

 of the idle and speculative rather than of the busy and 

 ambitious." 



