1 6 
NATURE NOTES. 
the stories, most of which we are obliged reluctantly to decline. 
Several newspapers whose columns were until lately reserved 
for such comparatively trivial subjects as politics, finance, and 
parliamentary intelligence have recently admitted letters from 
correspondents, who vie with each other in proclaiming that the 
particular pet of each is superior to all others. The Daily Neivs 
has initiated an interesting and amusing discussion of this kind, 
which took its rise from a false reading of a passage in Mrs. 
Brightwen’s Wild Nature won by Kindness. But the Daily News 
has been by no means alone in its readiness to march with the 
times and its discrimination of the subjects most likely to attract 
the British Public. In the words of a contemporary “For some 
time past there has been a great boom in animals. The Spectator 
has told us of their imitative instinct. We have read ‘ Notes 
from the Zoo ’ in the Saturday Review." To these we must add 
a series of articles on “ Home Pets” begun in the Speaker, which 
promise to throw much light upon questions of comparative 
psychology, if those which are to come prove of equal value to 
the first in which a lively writer narrates how he has compara- 
tively tamed and kept in captivity some specimens of that in- 
teresting but irritating animal the “ Human Boy! ” Besides the 
various journals we have enumerated as newly acquired allies in 
the work of popularising Natural History there is of course the 
Animal World, which has for many years supplied its readers 
with invaluable anecdotes of intelligence, shewn by the so-called 
“ brute creation,” and its new companion, the Animal Guardian, 
whose appearance we are glad to hail, although we do not 
necessarily endorse the whole of its “ platform ” (if one may be 
allowed that convenient Yankeeism). Many of the commu- 
nications for which we are unable to find space in our over-loaded 
columns, might well be sent to some of the quarters indicated 
above : some, indeed, are of such a wondrous nature that we 
fear they would only find admittance in those periodicals whose 
useful function it is to purvey harmless fiction for the reading 
public. 
But to the “ self-denying ordinance,” which we are often 
obliged to enact with regard to the greater part of the tales which 
reach us, there are some exceptions. The value of a narrative 
is often dependent on the known character and position of the 
narrator. Without any disparagement to anecdotes kindly sent 
by contributors, we must confine ourselves to the following re- 
ceived from the Rev. F. O. Morris, of Nunburnholme Rectory. 
With regard to at least one department of the Selborne Society’s 
work, Mr. Morris was an ardent and active Selbornian long 
before the Selborne Society was founded. He has given a large 
part of a long and busy life to the protection of and pleading for 
unprotected animals, especially birds. 
Mr. Morris is a man of strong views strongly expressed. 
Many Selbornians may not agree with all the opinions which he 
advocates with the vigour of a youth and the experience of a 
veteran, but we all doubtless agree in our admiration of the 
