THE NATURALIST. 
VOL. IV., NO. XXVI.—NOVEMBER, 1838. 
LOCAL OCCURRENCES IN NATURAL HISTORY; 
Principally relating to the Banks of the Severn, and the Western 
District of Worcestershire. 
In Letters to Neville Wood , Esq. 
By Edwin Lees, F.L.S. 
Letter I. 
44 Qua; circumvolitas agilis Thyma V 
Horace, Ep. iii., 21. 
My dear Sir, —I took the liberty, in two papers published in The Naturalist 
(Vol. III., pp. 115 and 291), under your spirited and talented auspices, to throw 
out a few suggestions respecting the supposed popularity of Natural History 
considered as a study. I also pointed out that aspect under which the subject, 
in my opinion, really assumed a 44 popular ** garb, when, without being merely 
superficial, the ever-interesting appearances going on in the great theatre of 
Nature, are brought out before the public view, correctly stated and detailed— 
without an unnecessary and alarming array of technical battalia—interspersed 
with incident, and spiced with poetical imagery. I am not aware that the 
correctness of these views has been disputed, and the inference is, that the 
multitude are to be enlisted under the banners of Natural History by authors 
who will condescend to stoop from their high eminence, whether as observers 
or systematists, and address, not professors but students. 
I am quite aware, and perfectly ready to admit, that the anatomist or mono¬ 
grapher who writes in a language that secures him only learned readers or 
indicates discoveries in the dim obscurity of terminological lamp-light, appreciable 
only by his initiated brethren of the modern Babel, too familiar with nomenclature 
hoarse and portentous as 44 the roarings of the forest of Garganus,”* in effect 
enlarges the boundaries of knowledge; but I contend that his labours are imperfect? 
and comparatively useless, until he meets with an interpreter and commentator 
* 44 Garganum mugire pates nemus, aut mare Tuscum.' 1 ' — Hor., Ep. i., 202. 
VOL. IV.- NO. XXVI. 
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