122 NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS. 



The life of Mr. Wilson exhibits the complete triumph of genius" over the want of 

 education, and of persevering industry over the evils of poverty. Without any other 

 reliance than on his own faculties, and with a force of exertion which nothing could check 

 or retard, he has obtained a celebrity in science to which few men, in this country, can 

 aspire ; although many may be more highly favoured with the endowments of genius, and 

 more extensively gifted with the advantages of early education, and the bounties of 

 fortune. The life of Wilson shows, conclusively, that the temple of fame is open to the 

 most humble individual in the community, if he only attempts it with zeal and industry, 

 and with a judicious selection of the part which he intends to act on the theatre of the 

 world: and it may not be amiss to add, in opposition to the complaints of his biographer, 

 that notwithstanding he experienced, in some few instances, the slights of ignorance, 

 and the sneers of impertinence, yet that a liberal and enlightened community bore witness 

 to his merits by a munificent subscription, which, after satisfying all expenses, would 

 have placed him, if living, on the enviable ground of independence. 



The science of Ornithology is involved in considerable difficulty and confusion. The 

 arrangement of animals according to the principles of the Linnaean system, is an admirable 

 contrivance to extricate the science of zoology from the darkness which surrounded it. 

 The classes and orders of the great naturalist are arbitrary : the genera and species are 

 natural ; but when we consider that the general characters of birds are taken from the 

 bill, tongue, nostrils, cere, caruncles, and other naked parts — and that the characters of 

 the species are derived principally from the plumage and habitudes, we must be sensible 

 that here is a wide field for a difference of opinion. Besides, the nomenclature adopted, 

 in endeavouring to compress the descriptions of animals within the shortest compass, is 

 frequently a mystery to most readers. Take, for instance, an account of a bird by Lin- 

 naeus, Latham, or Pennant, and it will require considerable industry to penetrate the 

 exact meaning of the author. The generic characters frequently run so closely into 

 each other, that it is no easy task to make the appropriate arrangement. The plumage 

 of birds varies according to seasons, to age, and to climate, and their manners assume a 

 different appearance at different times, and in different countries. The sexes exhibit, 

 almost invariably, a diversity. The male is frequently smaller than the female, and is 

 generally arrayed in a more beautiful dress. Genera are confounded together; varieties 

 are represented as distinct species ; the male is placed in a different species from his 

 mate, and the same bird, at different ages and seasons, is considered a different species. 

 The names of birds vary in different places. 



In the same district of country the same bird frequently goes by different appellations, 

 and the scientific name is also not uniform ; Linnaeus, Brisson, and Buffon, oftentimes dis- 



