120 



KIDD'S OWN JOURNAL. 



boys eschew their night-shirts, and go to 

 bed in their socks. 



"Yes," quoth a little boy, to whom we 

 read this passage — "and make their younger 



brother go to bed rirst !' 



ORIGINAL CORRESPONDENCE. 



Naturalists {so-called), and their " Exclusive- 

 ness." — As an ardent, though insignificant student 

 of nature, I naturally take an interest in every 

 thing tending to tbe spread of knowledge, and 

 the advancement of science. Judge then with what 

 pleasure I hailed the advent of the " Naturalist," 

 elder brother to "ourowx." Nor has my ad- 

 miration of it abated one jot, as month by month 

 I have pored over its pages. " There never," so 

 says the proverb, " was a rose without a thorn ;" 

 and I am sorry to say that in the twenty-second 

 number, I have at last found something which, if 

 not a thorn-proper, is "very like one." In con- 

 cluding a series of papers on the Lepidoptera of 

 the west of Scotland, &c, Mr. John Gray, of Glas- 

 gow, after settling to his own evident satisfaction 

 the rank which "Local Notes" on Natural His- 

 tory ought to occupy, thus develops his peculiar 

 ideas. " We know not how far our feelings in 

 these and former remarks have been shared by 

 the entomological readers of the ' Naturalist ;' but 

 glad should we be if they have had the effect of 

 arousing enquiry and careful study of the truths 

 of nature in any. Then, instead of the insipid 

 ' lists of captures,' and ' curious facts,' worthless in 

 themselves, and sometimes not free from vulgarity, 

 which adorn the pages of some magazines of Na- 

 tural History, we might hope to see observations 

 made, and conclusions arrived at, of permanent 

 value, — a bright contrast to the episodes of stroll- 

 ing dabblers', whose effusions, whilst offensive 

 to the eye, are alike beneath our criticism 

 and contempt." I can easily imagine the 

 indignation which honest Mr. Gray must feel, 

 at the bare idea of a 'strolling dabbler' pre- 

 suming in his ignorance to catch a fly, and 

 examine it — unless by his express permission. But 

 I have yet to learn the philosophy of such wrath. It 

 seems to me a happy hit on the part of an au- 

 thor, to make an entomological monograph, like a 

 wasp, carry a sting in its tail. Mr. Gray ought 

 to know that dabblers are only so comparatively. 

 It might be of benefit to him to recollect the salu- 

 tary truth, that were Swammerdam, De Geer, or 

 Latrielle alive, and actuated by the same unchari- 

 table spirit as himself, it is within the range of 

 possibility that they might stigmatise even his 

 writings as " the worthless episodes of a dabbler." 

 Mr. Gray's remarks forcibly remind me of one of 

 the many foibles which characterised our schoolboy 

 days. Bathing on a sandy beach, the 'big boys,' 

 who could wade out till the water reached their 

 waists, made sport of the ' little boys,' who dared 

 not venture beyond knee depth ; and were them- 

 selves ridiculed by the still older lads, who had 

 learned a few strokes of swimming ; while the 

 grown-up man, who could cut the waters like a fish, 

 justly looked upon the whole as a boyish squabble. 

 Mr. Gray may have got up to the waist, or may 

 even have learned a few bold strokes ; but he 

 should not splash us who dare scarcely wet our 



knee-caps, lest the strong swimmer visit him rough- 

 ly in his turn. But no such feelings as these find 

 a resting place in the bosom of the true natural- 

 ist. To him, every fact, curious or common, is 

 valuable, as so much truth. Aye, and he will 

 even descend to what, in Mr. Gray's eves, is most 

 offensive and vulgar, — to glean ears of truth from 

 the rubbish in which they are hid. What says 

 our author about 'lists of captures?' He calls 

 them 'insipid ;' quite forgetting that no true his- 

 tory of insects or aught else can be compiled, un- 

 less facts are supplied. Surely the less compli- 

 cated these are, the better for the compilers' pur- 

 pose. Perhaps he also forgets that the four papers 

 he has just published under the above title, might 

 be reduced by the malicious reader to quite as low 

 a standard; unless indeed the spice with which 

 they end, may have the effect of seasoning them 

 to the critic's taste. It is principally, however, at 

 "popular writers on natural history" that Mr. 

 Gray's indignation seems intended to be pointed. 

 Does he not, or will he not know, that for even- 

 one who takes up natural history as a science, 

 scores take it up as an amusement ? For one who 

 will trouble himself with the merits of this, or that 

 system, the frivolity of such and such generic and 

 specific names, there are hundreds who go no fur- 

 ther than admiring the beauty of a flower or an 

 insect ; and perhaps knowing a few interesting 

 facts of its habits and economy. Who will dare 

 to say that such an one has no right to study as 

 he pleases ; or as his time and circumstances will 

 allow him ? Or who will hazard the opinion that 

 he has not as high a sense of the power, wisdom, 

 and goodness of the Creator, as the Naturalist- 

 proper, with his cabinets, and books ; with his 

 systems of physiology, classification, and distribu- 

 tion? I am far from doubting that the wider aim 

 is the nobler of the two ; but few, I think, will 

 deny that, while the scientific student has his 

 quartos and his folios, the more simple observer 

 should have his popular books, and magazines. 

 The charge of vulgarity I cannot see clear. Vul- 

 garity now means, with most people, bad-taste ; 

 and with a few more, difference of caste. Now, I 

 may be a very vulgar man, because I cannot com- 

 mand the knowledge or language of another ; but 

 I fear me, this vulgarity must be laid — by the 

 same rule — to the door of all writers who have a 

 superior. If it augurs good taste in a writer to 

 finish a paper on insects, with a tirade upon their 

 humbler fellow laborers in the same cause ; to 

 throw contumely on the lover of truth because, 

 forsooth, he does not go so far as he might do ; to 

 stigmatise as 'strolling dabblers' all who presume 

 to hold unsophisticated converse with nature, and 

 record the facts which they learn from her in plain 

 unscientific language ; then I will humbly but 

 cheerfully bear the reproach of 'vulgarity;' and 

 remain, with every respect for Mr. Gray, as a Na- 

 turalist — " A Strolling Dabbler." 



[We readily insert your communication ; nor 

 , are you the only party aggrieved by Mr. Gray's 

 : injudicious and uncalled-for comments. He strikes 

 ' at our journal — at every Journal that gives en- 

 J couragement to persons who would be seeking 

 : harmless information on matters of Natural His- 

 1 tory. These " exclusive" feelings he has a right 

 ! to ; we do not question that right. Still we must 

 | regret that an avowed "Lover of Nature " should 



