122 
ON THE POPULARITY OF NATURAL HISTORY. 
educated under the old system, and how then can the study of Natural History 
be correctly appreciated yet ? how can it be truly popular at present ? 
I have alluded to these things that naturalists may not be deceived,—much, 
very much, remains to be done before Natural History as a science is popular* 
and this ought to be known and acted upon. This really concerns both the 
readers of, and the writers in, The Naturalist. As a child who has learned to 
walk disdains the leading strings, so the proficient in science is anxious to pro¬ 
claim his acquirements. But if he gets on so far as to be out of hearing, he. can 
only address the echoes, and perhaps he had better pause a moment for his com> 
patriots to get up. To speak plainly, writers must not yet become so obscure as 
to be understood only by the learned, and readers ought to consider that if new 
facts and discoveries and abstruse dissertations are. their delight, there are others 
who must be charmed into the path of science by pictures assimilated to their less 
soaring ideas, and by language which will not be to them an undeciphered hiero^ 
glyphic. Sir James Smith complained that Sowerby’s beautiful plates of Bri¬ 
tish plants made empirical botanists, as persons turned over the plates to com¬ 
pare with the plant they had found, and neglected the correct method of con¬ 
sulting the generic and specific descriptions.* This might be so, for there will 
always be lazy fellows in the world ready to pounce upon knowledge in the 
easiest way; but Sir James should have considered that science was surely bene- 
fitted, because, as his descriptions were purchased with the plates , they could not 
well be got rid of, while in all probability he who commenced with the plates, 
examined the descriptions at last. So it is in literature,—a man opening a work 
for amusement , shrinks from a catalogue of names that seems to present an aw¬ 
ful appearance to his eye, and looks for a lighter article, and yet probably that 
lighter article may, when his attention is once excited, lead him to study and 
duly appreciate the once abandoned and formidable catalogue of unknown names. 
The enquiry I have broached ought to claim the attention of Natural History 
Societies. Many of these have arisen with bright prospects within the last five 
or six years. Some have gone to the tomb of the Capulets—others have flou¬ 
rished—a few perhaps maintain a precarious existence. None have, I think, 
done what might have been expected from them. They perhapsl trust to the 
“popularity of Natural History.” Vain delusion! it is their duty to make 
Natural History popular. What steps have they taken to do this ? Have they 
encouraged its votaries ? Invited its friends to state their views to its mem¬ 
bers ? Opened communications with men of science throughout the kingdom ? 
Given every encouragement personally and unitedly to publications illustrative 
of the subject they profess to appreciate ? Have they published synopses of the: 
Preface to his English Flora., 
