82 



THE YOUNG NATURALIST. 



altered, and now is used by a somewhat 

 extensive political club ; in fact it is ques- 

 tionable if any of the old house still remains. 

 The hill is now covered by cottages, houses 

 of rather superior class, a large board school, 

 co-operative stores, chapels, and public, 

 houses, and is now called "Primrose Hill.'' 

 But then, that is at the time of Varley's 

 birth, the house in which he was born, a 

 one-storied shant, was one of the very few, 

 if not the only house upon the hill. The 

 ground, which is now intersected by streets, 

 causeways, and other improvements, was 

 very different then ; green fields, hedgerows, 

 buttercups and daises, even wild roses 

 could be seen from the window, or shed 

 their perfume, which was borne by the pass- 

 ing breeze and carried to the very hearth. 

 Spa Wood, which is now partly covered 

 with houses, and the other part destitute of 

 trees, was then a wood of some extent: It 

 covered one side of the hill, and was over 

 half a mile in length, sloping down to the 

 bank of the river Holme. There the boys 

 used to ramble to seek birds' nests in the 

 wood, or to fish or bathe in the river below. 

 James, among the rest, went to revel in the 

 wood, to hear the birds sing and to seek 

 their nests. Many birds, which are now 

 seldom or never seen in the neighbourhood, 

 were common then. One of these, the Red- 

 backed Shrike or Lesser Butcher-bird 

 nested not uncommonly in Spa Wood, and 

 Varley often related how he used to find 

 blackbeetles and other insects impaled upon 

 the thorns, and how it puzzled him to 

 account for them being there. The night- 

 ingale also used occasionally to visit this 

 wood, and one of the earliest incidents of 

 his life, and one he often related in his after 

 years, was when his father took him and 

 his brothers one night, to hear the nightin- 

 gale sing in Spa Wood. These incidents, 

 with the natural love he had for the field, 

 the wood, and for nature generally, did 

 much, no doubt, towards developing that 



quality which afterwards made him such a 

 devoted lover of her works. 



From his birth he was a weakly child. ,i 

 In after years he always said that it was 

 vaccination — or " innoculation," as it was 

 then called — that ruined his health ; but be 

 that as it may, he was, when a child, very 

 weak and puny. He was four years old 

 before he was able to walk, and for some 

 time before then, his father or his mother, 

 acting on the doctor's advice, used to take 

 him out of his bed in a morning, wrap him 

 up in a blanket, take him to the river Colne 

 and dip him in. He has often said that 

 though he was four years old before he was 

 able to walk, he had done enough walking 

 since, to make up for all that, and much more. 



Every boy at that time followed the 

 practise, which many boys still do, of rob- 

 bing birds' nests. Their chief object was 

 destruction, for having obtained the eggs 

 they either pelted them with stones, or 

 pierced each end with any sharp instrument, 

 emptied them of their contents, and threaded 

 them upon a string, to hang over the mantle 

 shelf or round the head of the case clock. 

 But James seems to have gone to the woods 

 with a better object in view — that of obser- ' 

 vation ;— for, although he did frequently 

 bring eggs home and string them as others i', 

 did, because he knew no better, yet beseems 

 to have had his eyes and his ears open : the j i 

 songs of the birds, the appearances of the i . 

 flowers or butterflies, made an impression, 

 and in many cases a very lasting impression, \ . 

 upon his mind. He was ever fond of ram- 

 bling in the lanes after butterflies, gathering is 

 flowers, or of hunting the wood for birds' : . 

 nests. His parents, held down by scanty j j, 

 means, were unable to send their children , . 

 to school. James never went to a school in ; . 

 his life, except the Sunday school, where i. 

 little was taught, yet the amount of learning ' 

 which he accumulated shows what a power 

 there is in the study of nature for those 

 who are devoted to it. Had he been better, 1 



