10 



POPULAR HISTORY OP LICHENS. 



sipate his time ; the tourist among our Highlands and 

 Islands, whose chief aim is too frequently to pass over the 

 greatest amount of space in the shortest possible time, and 

 who too seldom merges from the beaten track laid down in 

 his favourite guide-book ; the Art student in search of the 

 picturesque among our hills and vales, who cannot truly 

 appreciate the picturesque without being acquainted with 

 the minutest elements of which it is composed ; and the fair 

 denizen of our urban drawing-rooms, whose accomplishments, 

 gained it may be at a great expense of time and money, are 

 too frequently frivolous and profitless, and who have, more 

 than any class of persons above mentioned, the necessary 

 time and qualifications. By following out any branch of 

 natural history, the invalid finds a new charm in every w r alk ; 

 he feels that he can profitably employ, without mental or 

 bodily fatigue, even the idleness which illness has thrust 

 upon him, by acquainting himself with the characters of the 

 lowliest yet not least interesting, organisms in the scale of 

 vegetable or animal life. It may not be supererogatory here 

 to remind the reader of the well-acknowledged influence over 

 the human mind of gently-exciting studies as moral medi- 

 cines of the most soothing, and intellectual food of the most 

 nourishing, kind. We would commend the invalid — 



