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LIFE OF ALFRED NEWTON, M.A., RR.S.

PROFESSOR OF ZOOLOGY AND COMPARATIVE ANATOMY
IN THE UNIVERSITY OF CAMBRIDGE, 1866-1907

Frontispiece.

ALFRED NEWTON, M.A., F.R.S.

LIFE OF
ALFRED NEWTON

PROFESSOR OF COMPARATIVE ANATOMY
CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITY, 1866-1907

BY A. F. R. WOLLASTON

WITH A PREFACE BY SIR ARCHIBALD GEIKIE, O.M.

WITH ILLUSTRATIONS

LONDON

JOHN MURRAY, ALBEMARLE STREET, W.

1921

All rights reserved

NOTE

WHEN in the spring of 1909 his literary executors paid
me the compliment of asking me to write a "Life"
of Professor Newton, I accepted the invitation with
enthusiasm tempered by diffidence, little guessing the
delays to which it would be subjected, and little know-
ing the difficulties of the task. It became very soon
apparent that the interests of so sedentary a life as that
of Newton must be looked for principally in his letters.
This led to the startling discovery that he had kept
almost every letter he received during a period of more
than fifty years, and to the further fact that a great
many of his correspondents had preserved almost every
letter that he had written to them. Searching through
these thousands of letters was a work of several months ;
and after that I was unavoidably occupied in New
Guinea for a term of years. During these absences from
England — and later during the war — I made attempts
to induce others to complete the " Life," but without
success.

So it was not until 1920 that I was able to return
to it. In the meantime the business of producing
books, like all other things, has suffered a change, and
the ample biographies of the spacious days before 1914
are no longer possible. Thus it happens that this
volume has been reduced by nearly a half of its bulk,
greatly to the advantage of the casual reader, if such

vi NOTE

there be, but, I fear, at the cost of some disappoint-
ment to others who had hoped to see their interesting
correspondence with Newton included in the book. In
cutting down I have tried to act on the principle of
preserving his best and most characteristic letters on
whatever subject, rather than of including technically
important matters, which are elsewhere accessible to
naturalists.

The help that I have received from Newton's friends
and from members of his family has, I hope, been in
every case gratefully acknowledged. There are two —
Mr. James E. Harvie-Brown and Lord Walsingham —
whose names must be recorded here : both of them
have followed their old friend, but not before they had
given me incalculable help in my attempt to preserve
his memory.

A. F. R. W.

April, 1921.

PREFACE

THE subject of this volume, a man of strongly-marked
personality, was for more than half a century a leader
among the naturalists of this country, a distinguished
Professor in the University of Cambridge, a prolific
and accomplished writer, and a charming companion,
whose geniality, humour, and innocent little whimsi-
calities, drew around him a wide circle of friends. All
who knew Alfred Newton will be glad that Mr.
Wollaston, one of his pupils, should have put together
this appreciative memoir. In so doing he has been
fortunate in having had access to so large a number
of the Professor's letters and journals as to give the
chapters not a little of the character of an auto-
biography.

We see the future man of science entering Magdalene
College, Cambridge, in 1848, as an undergraduate of
nineteen. Six years later his youthful reputation
gained for him, as the son of a Norfolk squire, election
to the Norfolk Travelling Scholarship, with the aid
of which he was enabled to make ornithological re-
searches in Lapland and Iceland, and to visit the
United States and the West Indies. These early
journeys confirmed his bent towards the study of
birds, and laid the foundation of his fame as one
of the most eminent ornithologists of his day. He
used to regret in later life that he had not travelled

vu

viii PREFACE

more. He was indeed a born naturalist, and but for
the lameness, which came from an accident in early
boyhood, he would doubtless have become a dauntless
pioneer in zoological regions as yet unexplored. Few
bird-lovers could equal him in the quickness and sure-
ness of eye which, even at a considerable distance,
enabled him to distinguish a bird on the wing. The
lameness, much increased by an accident in later years,
greatly restricted the exploratory work which he might
have achieved. It was most heroically borne by him,
and was combated with two walking-sticks. He was
too independent, however, to accept assistance if he
could possibly do without it. In the yachting cruises
which for some years I enjoyed in his company along
the western coasts of Scotland, Ireland, and the Faroe
Isles, he generally would land at every place of interest,
even when a strong swell made it difficult to get into
the boat. One could not but admire the tact with
which he avoided the proffered hands of the crew,
and his dexterity in the manipulation of his two sticks.
His perfect coolness was remarkable on such occasions.
He used to tell how once at Spitzbergen the dinghy
slipped away before he had hold of the ship's ladder
and he plumped into the water, but kept his pipe in
his mouth, and so, as he said, lost nothing !

It was about 1863 that he made Cambridge his
permanent home. In 1866 he was elected Professor
of Zoology and Comparative Anatomy in the Uni-
versity. He then began at once with much ardour
to improve the Zoological Museum, which in his hands
became in the course of years one of the most important
in the country. His kindly nature led him to take
much interest in the undergraduates who showed a
love of natural history. His " Sunday evenings " at
Magdalene, when he received his students, academical

PREFACE ix

friends, and any notable men of science who might
be visiting Cambridge, were highly popular. Mr.
Wollaston testifies to their value from the under-
graduate point of view.

Professor Newton was an indefatigable worker,
never without some piece of scientific literature on
hand, and often more than one. He was a keen critic
of others, and not less of himself. He would write
and re-write his compositions several times before they
came up to his standard of arrangement and style.
Above all he strove to secure accuracy in his own
statements, and in his references and quotations. The
pains taken by him with this object sometimes led to
serious delays in the completion of his manuscript,
which brought strong protests from the publishers,
who had no sympathy with what they regarded as
meticulous labour. If their complaints did not alter
his habit, they at least filled him with indignation
against the whole publishing tribe.

Newton was a strong Conservative, instinctively
opposed to the abrogation of any ancient usage. This
resolute stand on the antiquas vias led him occasionally
into whimsical positions, some of which are alluded to
in the following chapters. Yet it is nevertheless true
that he was one of the earliest naturalists in this
country to accept Darwin's explanation of the origin of
species. Not only did he receive with joy and admira-
tion this momentous revolution in scientific thought,

O '

he actually made some effort to induce his brother
naturalists to do likewise, but without success.

The reader of the volume mav, in some measure,

* '

appreciate the personal charm which endeared the
Professor to those around him. His perennial bonhomie,
his youthful enthusiasms maintained up to the last, his
inexhaustible fund of anecdote and reminiscence, his

x PREFACE

unfailing good humour, his love of work, and his gener-
ous co-operation in the doings of every fellow-worker
who needed his help, together with the amusing pre-
dicaments in which his conversation sometimes placed
him, combined to make a rare and delightful person-
ality, and underneath it all lay the solid and lasting
service rendered by him to the branch of science to
which he devoted his life.

ARCHIBALD GEIKIE.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

CHAPTEE I

CHILDHOOD AND SCHOOL

PAQE

William Newton — His sons — Birth of Alfred at Geneva — Elveden
Hall — Sport at Elveden — Accident in childhood — Affection for
his brother Edward — Early interest in Natural History — School
— First visit to Cambridge — Letters from school — Dogs and
pets — Enters at Cambridge 1

CHAPTER II

EARLY INTEREST IN NATURAL HISTORY

Magdalene — Takes degree — Norfolk Travelling Fellowship — Other
naturalists— John Wolley — Wolley's experiences in Lapland —
Sales of eggs — Newton goes to Lapland — Interest in northern
faunas — Musk Ox — Breeding-place of Knot — Alfred Newton
Glacier — Visit to W. Indies — Notes on Humming-birds — Visit
to U.S.A.— J. H. Gurney 11

CHAPTER III

VISIT TO ICELAND

Visit to Iceland — Lands in Faroe — The Meal Sack — Hospitality at
Reykjavik — Learning Icelandic — Journey through Iceland —
Streams of lava — Beykjanes — Submarine eruption — Habits of
Great Auk — Failure of expedition 27

CHAPTER IV

THE GREAT AUK

Extinction of Great Auk — History of the bird — Buying a Great
Auk's egg — Its obscure history — Discovery of ten Great Auks'
eggs — Gare-fowl book — Visit to Great Auk's breeding-places —
Dodo and other extinct birds — Great Bustard — Acclimatisation
and extermination ......... 40

xi

xii TABLE OF CONTENTS

CHAPTEE V

THE IBIS

PAQE

Origin of B.O.U. — Founders — Journal — Motto — Editorship of Ibis —
Canon Tristram — Wolley's collections — " Ootheca Wolleyana "
—Memoir of John Wolley 61

CHAPTEK VI

VISIT TO SPITZBERGEN

Shooting in Denmark — Visit to Germany — Decides not to take
holy orders — Prince Dhuleep Singh and Elveden — Visit to
Spitzbergen — Voyage from Leith — Birds in Ice Sound — Snow
Buntings — Eiders — Reindeer — Nordenskjold — Seals — Upset
from boat — Fogs and calms — Bear Island and Hammerfest . 73

CHAPTEE VII

DR. SHIPLEY'S REMINISCENCES
(Written by the Master of Christ's)

Cambridge in the 'forties — Railway station — Magdalene in 1849
— Professor Adarni — Francis Balfour — Adam Sedgwick —
William Bateson — Newton's lectures — Hospitality — Character 93

CHAPTEE VIII

EARLY DAYS OF DARWINISM

Early days of Darwinism — Newton's acceptance of theory — British
Association at Oxford in 1860 — Huxley and the Bishop of
Oxford — Dr. Temple— Tristram's defection — Manchester meet-
ing— Letter from Darwin — Zoological Record — Mendelism —
Programme for Section D — Sclater and Louis Napoleon — Red
Lions — Professorship of Zoology — Charles Kingsley . . .110

CHAPTEE IX

PROTECTION OF BIRDS

Zoological aspect of Game Laws — Destruction of Sea-fowl — Close-
time Committee — Bird Protection Bills and Acts — Letters to
Lord Walsingham— Skuas — Protection of eggs— Protection of
areas — Society for the Protection of Birds — Egg-collecting . 136

TABLE OF CONTENTS xiii

CHAPTER X

MIGRATION AND DISTRIBUTION

PAGE

Migration of birds — Letter of Scandinavian Poet — Newton's reply
— Theories of migration — Torpidity and other superstitions —
Gatke — Mr. Eagle-Clarke's observations at lighthouses —
Destruction of life — History of migration— Aristotle and
Pliny — Geographical distribution — Ptarmigan — Origin of life—
Holarctic Eegion — A, R. Wallace — Address at Manchester . 160

CHAPTEE XI

GILBERT WHITE AND OTHERS

Gilbert White — Reviews of " Selborne " — Coleridge's Marginalia —

Gilbert White's wig—" Selborne " a classic— Mr. Holt- White's

" Life "— " Molly " letters— Mulso's letters— Thomas Bewick—

-Willughby— Ray— Gould— F. Buckland— T. Edwards— R.

Jefferies — H. Seebohm 186

CHAPTER XII

METHODS OF WORK

Accuracy — Care in identification — The Scaup Duck — Bustard-
Great Black Woodpecker — Vipers swallowing young — Slow-
ness in work — Yarrell's " British Birds " — Classification' —
Linnaean system — Nomenclature — Subspecies and trinomials . 207

CHAPTER XIII

LANGUAGES AND WORDS

Correspondence with Professor Skeat — De Avosetta — Capercaillie —

Mistletoe Thrush — Decoy— Okapi — No Snakes in Iceland . 220

CHAPTER XIV

WRITING AND CONSERVATISM

Letter-writing — B. M. Cats. — Dedications — Zoological anecdote-
Professor Babington and suet puddings — " Dictionary of Birds "
—Publishers — Revisions — Style — Reviewers — The Cuckow —
Philosophy — Politics and College politics — Mr. A. C. Benson's
reminiscences— Bores - Interest in young naturalists . . 234

xiv TABLE OF CONTENTS

CHAPTEB XV

WORK AT CAMBRIDGE

PAGE

Lectures — Zoological training — Invertebrata — Jack Perkins and the
Duke of Cambridge — Museum — Bos primigenius — Letters
from Charles Kingsley — Special Board — Greek play — "Birds"
of Aristophanes — Hospitality in College — The Old Lodge —
Sunday evenings — Dr. Guillenaard's recollections . . . 250

CHAPTEB XVI

LATER YEARS

Cornish Choughs — Heligoland and accident — Sir Archibald Geikie's
account of cruises — St. Kilda and Orkneys — The song of the
Shearwater — Death of Sir Edward Newton — The Professor in
old age — Portraits — Honours— Last days — Death . . . 275

CHAPTER XVII
MISCELLANEOUS LETTERS 293

APPENDIX
LIST OF PUBLISHED PAPERS 316

INDEX 325

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

PROFESSOR ALFRED NEWTON Frontispiece

SIR EDWARD NEWTON, K.C.M.G Facing page 62

THIRD BARON LILFORD » « 120

CANON H. B. TRISTRAM, F.R.S „ „ 120

THE PROFESSOR. From a sketch by C. M. Nciuton . ,, „ 258

LIFE OF ALFRED NEWTON

CHAPTER I

CHILDHOOD AND SCHOOL

IP the boundary of the counties of Norfolk and Suffolk
had not taken a sudden bend to the south near Thetford,
so as almost to include the parish of Elveden, it is
probable that the life of Alfred Newton, though it would
undoubtedly have been the life of a man of distinction,
would not have been the life of a naturalist. Fortunately
for lovers of Natural History in general and of Orni-
thology in particular, his father, as well as owning Elveden
Hall in Suffolk, possessed also a small property on the
other side of the boundary and was a Justice of the
Peace for the county of Norfolk, so that at a critical
point of his career Newton was able to establish his
claim to be the " son of a Norfolk gentleman."

William Newton, at one time M.P. for Ipswich, was
the son of a planter, Samuel Newton of St. Kitts, in the
West Indies, in the golden days of sugar, who lived in the
island of St. Croix until he bought the Elveden estate in
1810 from the fourth Earl of Albemarle. He married
(1811) Elizabeth, daughter of Richard Slater Milnes, M.P.
for York, and aunt of Richard Monckton Milnes, first
Baron Houghton, by whom he had six sons and four
daughters. The eldest son, William Samuel, was one of
the survivors of the Coldstream Guards at Inkerman,
and retired with the rank of General. The second son,
Robert Milnes, became Recorder of Cambridge and a
Metropolitan Police Magistrate. Horace Parker was

B

2 CHILDHOOD AND SCHOOL

first of his year at the R.M.A., Woolwich ; he served with
the Royal Artillery in the Crimea and retired with the
rank of Major-General. The youngest son, Edward,
K.C.M.G. (1832-97), was at one time Colonial Secretary
of Mauritius and subsequently Colonial Secretary and
Lieutenant-Governor of Jamaica.

Alfred was the fifth son of William Newton of
Elveden. In 1828 Mr. Newton with his wife, seven
children and a suitable retinue of nurses and couriers,
drove in the leisurely fashion of those days from Elveden
to Pisa in the family chariot. On their way back through
Switzerland in the following year the family halted for
a time at Geneva, where Alfred was born on June 11,
1829, at a house, " Les Delices," * which was at that
time far beyond the limits of the town, but has now
become surrounded by the growing suburbs of Geneva.
In the next year they returned to Elveden, which
continued to be the family home until after the death of
Mr. Newton more than thirty years later.

The Elveden Hall of those days was like many other
East Anglian country houses, a plain Georgian mansion
of brick, built about 1770 by Admiral Augustus Keppel,
first and last Viscount Keppel of Elveden, upon whose
death, in 1786, it passed to his nephew, the Earl of
Albemarle. It is probable that there had never been an
earlier house at Elveden, although the district had been
renowned for centuries as one of the finest sporting
countries in England. King James I. after visiting
Newmarket in 1605, proceeded to Thetford, where he
stayed for some time and was greatly struck by the

* In Morley's " Voltaire " (chap, iv.) it is stated that Voltaire " made him-
self a hermitage for the summer, called the Delices, a short distance from
the spot where the Arve falls into the Rhone." This is without doubt the
house in which Alfred Newton was born. One of his nephews writes :
" The explanation why none of us should ever have heard about this before
is that our elders considered Voltaire a horrible person whose name should
never be mentioned by respectable people."

SHOOTING AT ELVEDEN 3

quantities of game he saw there. He was with difficulty
dissuaded from enforcing a dormant proclamation,
which would have had the result of making the whole
country a royal game preserve, but contented himself
by claiming all the sporting rights over the country
within twelve miles of Thetford and appointing a royal
gamekeeper at a salary of two shillings a day. The
same course was followed by his sport-loving successors,
Charles I. and Charles II.

In the early days of the nineteenth century, before
the breech-loading gun had been invented, and when
pheasant-rearing was yet in its infancy, the bags obtained
at Elveden were not to be compared with the " records '
of later years, but the sport there must have been as
good as at any place in the kingdom.

A bag which I believe had never been exceeded was
made at Elveden in my father's time, 331 or 332 pheasants
in one day, of which over 300 were cock birds, and not
one of them reared by hand. This was in the " twenties,"
before I was born.

It seems, too, that in those times game was less care-
fully preserved and the boundaries of neighbouring
estates were not so strictly marked as is the case now-
adays.

I have heard my father say that when he first went
to Elveden, it was a common thing for a " gentleman "
going from one country house to another to " shoot his
way over," sending his servant and luggage by road, and
that in particular in the autumn race meetings at
Newmarket guests invited thence to stay at Euston
made a habit of doing this, and he once found some
distinguished persons pursuing a covey of Partridges on
the Great Heath at Elveden. If anybody but a " gentle-
man " had tried this on he would have found the custom
very different. It was also customary for officers in the

4 CHILDHOOD AND SCHOOL

army, when changing quarters, to rove as they passed in
search of game, and nobody said anything to them.
You will find this mentioned in Col. Hawker's diary, but
he, not being a gentleman, tried the same thing on when
he was in quarters and there he found himself wrong.

Although, judged by modern standards, the quantity
of pheasants and partridges was not very great, there
was ample compensation, to a naturalist, in the existence
of several rare birds which still survived in the Elveden
district. It is true that the Great Bustard was on the
verge of extinction — the last of the native stock was
killed in 1838 — but Montagu's Harriers were fairly
common in the fens near Feltwell, Buzzards still nested
in some of the big woods, and Ravens bred every year at
Elveden, where they survived until 1870. The vast
warrens of the " Breck," the woods and water-meadows
of the valley of the Little Ouse, and the neighbouring
Fenland between them made an ideal training ground
for a naturalist.

The only detail that is known of Alfred Newton's
childhood is an incident which affected profoundly the
whole of his after life. When he was not more than five
or six years old, he was playing some riotous game with
one of his brothers in the library at Elveden and he fell
and hurt one of his knees. Little importance was
attached to it at first, but serious injury had been done
and his right leg never grew equally with the other,
causing him to be permanently lame. It may be that
this accident prevented him from following his brothers'
example and becoming a soldier, a career in which it may
safely be said that he would have won certain distinction.
But one very definite result which followed from his
lameness was the encouragement it gave him in his
earliest years to acquire habits of observation and
contemplation. As time went on and he was debarred

GUESTS AT ELVEDEN 5

to a great extent from the more active pursuits of his
elder brothers, he came to rely more for companionship
upon his younger brother, Edward. The affection — it
might almost be called devotion — that Alfred and Edward
had for each other was much more than is commonly
seen between brothers, and it lasted unchanged until the
death of the younger brother ten years before that of the
elder. Edward's tastes were in many ways the same as
those of Alfred, but though he was strong and active, he
would do nothing that Alfred could not do, and it is said
that as a child he wished that he might be lame too, so
that they might, so to speak, '' start fair." The two
boys did everything together and were almost insepa-
able ; the collection of birds and eggs was " ours," their
dogs were the joint property of both, and their records
of observations were kept in notebooks labelled " A. and
E. N."

But it must not be supposed that he was debarred by
his lameness from out-of-door amusements : he rode,
and as a shot he was not much inferior to his brother
Edward, who became afterwards one of the finest shots
in England. Mr. Newton used to entertain many of his
neighbours during the shooting season — the Newcomes
from Feltwell, Lord March, George Hanbury, the
Waddingtons from Cavenham, were frequent guests at
Elveden. Another visitor was a ' Mr. Bainbridge, a
friend of my father's, who used to come and stay and
on one occasion brought a bear pie ; we were very much
annoyed because he did not bring the skull." In the
summer the brothers were very much occupied with
bird's-nesting, and they began to form their collection of
eggs about 1840. About the same time, too, they began
to keep the careful records of the migration of birds,
which were continued, with only a few intervals, for
twenty years. One of their " dodges ' was to fill a

6 CHILDHOOD AND SCHOOL

pocket with gun-wads and as they walked about the
woods and warrens at Elveden to transfer to another
pocket one wad for each species of bird seen. In the
evening they recorded their observations in an elaborate
register,* and in this way they began to have some
knowledge of the internal and local movements of birds
as well as of the more conspicuous migrations of spring
and autumn. From the keeping of birds in cages, which
was naturally a feature of this period in their careers,
they advanced to the more difficult business of keeping
wild-fowl. The meres of Wretham and Stanford supplied
them with several species of wild duck, with which they
made experiments in hybridisation. More fortunate
than the ducks, which often came to untimely ends, was
a swan : "for the last six years I have had a Hooper, a
most engaging bird — at times almost too familiar, for he
invades the house, where his company is not always
most agreeable."

In 1844 Alfred went to Mr. Walker's school at
Stetchworth, near Newmarket, and from this time dates
his life-long correspondence with Edward. When they
were in England the two brothers wrote to each other
every day, and by every mail when they were abroad ;
and each one kept carefully all the letters of the other.
In early days they addressed each other by their
pet-names, " Tafi " and " Tedge," but these were
considered childish by their elders, and a more formal
epistle was marked " for the family," while their own
particular business was " not to be shown." School at
Mr. Walker's was not very arduous, and holidays, which
depended on the getting of so many marks, seem to have
been frequent. Alfred often drove over to Elveden, a
distance of about nineteen miles, for Sunday, and one

* A specimen page of this register was published in the Transactions of
the Norfolk and Norwich Nat. Hist. Soc., 1871, vol. i.

FIRST VISIT TO CAMBRIDGE 7

day in February, 1845, he went with his father to
Cambridge. He wrote from Stetchworth on March 1 : —

MY DEAREST TEDGE,

I must give you a long letter concerning my
doings at Cambridge. I spent my whole time, 3| hours,
in the Museum of the Phil. Soc.* I took one of my old
notebooks and a pencil and sketched the most striking
of the birds, writing down by the side the colours, etc.
The most beautiful British bird was the Indian Bee-eater,
of which I send you a coloured drawing. I also send you
a drawing of the Great Bustard, of which they have 4
specimens, 2 in. and 2 f . ; it is the most magnificent bird
I ever saw except the Capercaillie, the colours of which
were too difficult for me to draw. They have three
specimens of the Otis tetrax, a very pretty bird. There is
a magnificent Golden Eagle. I am now quite certain
that our bird is the Linota montium and not Linota
cannabina. Our Redpoll is also a (young) male bird and,
of course, it retains its immature plumage. The birds
are, with the exception of a few old specimens, very well
stuffed. A word now about the eggs, which are not
much, the Falco peregrinus and Otis tarda being the lions ;
I was much disappointed with that part of the Museum.
I was surprised at not seeing a specimen of the Regulus
ignicapellus there, as Mr. Jenyns is the premier with
regard to the Nat. Hist, department. They have a few
works on Nat. Hist., most presented by their authors.
Audubon's ' American Ornithology ' is a daub. The
" Nat. Hist, of the Voyage of H.M.S. Adventurer and
Beagle," is a beautiful book. There is also a book by
the author of " Taxidermy," on Freshwater Fishes,
coloured by hand. I was rather disappointed in seeing
the Kittiwake there, for unless it is an adult male in
breeding plumage (which is snow-white) I don't think
it is a very handsome bird. It is now quite dark, so
good-bye, dearest Tedge.

I am your most affectionate brother,

TAPF.

* House in All Saints Passage; now the Hawks Club.

8 CHILDHOOD AND SCHOOL

The notebook still exists and the drawings that he
made that day are remarkable for their accuracy and for
the skill with which he emphasised the most characteristic
features of the birds drawn. He was always very fond
of drawing, and although he never possessed very great
skill as an artist, his drawings, whether of birds, beasts
or landscapes, were invariably accurate. Many of his
letters are full of drawings and later, when he was abroad,
he illustrated the incidents of his travels with very
humorous sketches. The following letter was illustrated
with an excellent drawing of a Brambling : —

Stetchworth,

Friday, March 7, 1845.

MY DEAREST TEDGE,

I dare say you will like to hear how my
Brambling * is. He is perfectly well and is, (considering
that he was only caught yesterday) very tame, much
more so than Skelly [a Starling] is now. He goes on
picking about while I am standing at the cage. I have
given you a little sketch of Brammy's head, but / can't
describe his markings they are so beautiful. There were
5 caught (in a clap net), 2 m. 3 f. ; the 3 unfortunate
females were sent to Ditton with about 100 other birds
for a shooting match and were shot. The other male
bird fluttered itself to death in the store cage and was
roasted and eat before I knew of it. Thev are called here

i/

north-cocks. The man who caught them is going out
again to-morrow and so I trust I shall be able to get some
more. He caught some redpolls and reed sparrows, etc.,
so I can probably get some. His prices are very reason-
able, }d. or \d. for each bird. The reason I gave 6d. for
mine is that the man's little girl had picked it out of the
others for its beauty and had taken a great fancy for it.
I have not got a very secure cage for him, but I keep

* Fringilla montifringilla — Beak yellow, tip black ; nape snow white,
ear coverts black with green reflexions ; throat pale crimson- tawney, a
round white spot in the middle of the neck ; the rest of the head mottled
black and white.

DOGS AND PETS 9

him covered up and he does not try to get out ; I am
trying to borrow a cage. Many thanks for your letter.
When do you expect to get a siskin ? Thank Car for her
line, I must write to her in a day or two. I shall get the
holiday to-morrow as I have now got down 76 marks.
Love to all with Willy.*

I am yr. affecte. brother,

TAFF.

In many of his letters and, very likely, in his personal
behaviour to his brother, Alfred adopted very much the
attitude of the elder brother when they were boys ; he
was constantly correcting small mistakes in Edward's
letters and condemning any tendency he might have
towards making exaggerated statements. It was a
useful training for the younger boy, who learnt early to
make careful observations and became an excellent field-
naturalist, ' better than the best gamekeeper and as
good as a warrener," as Alfred said of him in later
days.

As well as ponies and ducks and other animals they
kept dogs, " Crab " and <: Wasp," and often a family of
puppies. Alfred used to say that he was always very
' doggy," but in after years, when he no longer lived in
the country, he thought it was not kind to keep one in a
town. When ' Crab ' died, he wrote to his brother
from Stetchworth, on May 3, 1845 : —

Poor Crab, I can do nothing but lament over his
death, in fact I can hardly believe it. Pray save some of
his hair, and have him buried honourably in the garden
as near the poor old pony as possible. I am now so
excessively sorry that I did not sketch his head when I
was last at home. I will certainly do the others directly
I go back. There is certainly a fatality attending the
Wasps. How many puppies are left ?

* Their nurse, Williamson.

10 CHILDHOOD AND SCHOOL

I think you have made some mistake as to the arrival
of the Hirundinidw at Elden.* You have written to me
that both Swallow and House Martin arrived at Elden
on April 4.

May I be allowed to say you have never before
mentioned on what day the Crow nidificated, and there-
fore I don't see how you can have written it to me
500,000,000,003 times. You never have said whether you
have a hooded crow's claw for me, if not, do you know of
any old one, as I have not got one ? The Redbacked
Shrike arrived this morning.

I have been to the Dyke. I found a redbreast's nest
with 5 eggs, I took one. Malcolm found a pheasant's,
which of course we cribbed. This is "en particulier."
I went to try to get a Longtailed tit's egg for Reynolds

but alas ! ! ! I bought a female wryneck alive to-day

for Qd. She is very tame, sits on my finger and runs ants
thro' with her long tongue. She has been caught only
two days. The boy won't tell me how he caught her I
really can't write any more. I will write to my sisters
to-morrow.

Believe me,

Dearest Edward,

Yr. most affecte. brother,

ALFRED.

The letter is illustrated with an admirable sketch of
the wryneck sitting on his finger and eating ants.

In 1846 he went for a few months to a tutor, the
Rev. Joseph Homer, vicar of Everton, near Biggleswade
in Bedfordshire, and in October, 1848, he entered as a
pensioner at Magdalene College, Cambridge.

* Elveden used to be pronounced Elden.

CHAPTER II

EARLY INTEREST IN NATURAL HISTORY

MAGDALENE in the " forties ' was a small college, and
very little is known of Newton's undergraduate days.
He twice won the College prize for an English essay,* and
it is said that on one occasion he coxed a winning four.
The only other event that is known of this period is that
he assisted his friend Charles Pierrepont Cleaver and two
or three other undergraduates in executing a painted
window for the College Chapel. In his second year he
was elected a member of the Pitt Club, which he con-
tinued to use as a convenient place for writing letters
during more than half a century. Although he was a
very fair classical scholar when he went up to Cambridge,
the Classical Tripos, which in those days was only open
to men who had already taken honours in Mathematics,
did not appeal to him. The Natural Sciences Tripos
was then in its infancy (the first examination was held in
1851), but he was not attracted by Chemistry and
Physics, which were the most important subjects in the
school at that time. He made the acquaintance of
Henslow, the famous Professor of Botany, and long
enjoyed his friendship ; his tastes, however, already
inclined him strongly towards the other branch of
Biology, and he regretted afterwards that he had never
become even a passable botanist. He graduated on
March 10, 1852, but as that day fell after Ash Wednesday
he was in the phraseology of the day a Baccalaureus

* His nephews and nieces founded an " Alfred Newton English Essay
Prize " at Magdalene in order to perpetuate his memory there.

11

12 EARLY INTEREST IN NATURAL HISTORY

Artium ad Baptistam, and consequently, by the regula-
tions then in force, was reckoned as a bachelor of 1853.

" In 1697 the Rev. Drue Drury bequeathed to Magda-
lene College the perpetual advowson of the vicarage of
Steeple Ashton, Wilts, and the impropriate parsonage of
the said place, to found a Travelling Fellowship for a
' gentleman's son of Norfolk.' In 1847 the value of
the Fellowship was £366 gross, £268 net." *

Owing to the fortunate circumstance mentioned
above of Mr. Newton holding the commission of the peace
for Norfolk, although a resident in Suffolk, and thanks to
the good offices of the then Master, George Neville-
Grenville (appointed Dean of Windsor in the same year),
Alfred Newton was elected in the spring of 1853 to the
Drury Travelling Fellowship, which happened to be
vacant. Unfortunately the church at Steeple Ashton
was sadly in need of repair at that time ; funds were
diverted to pay the cost of restoring the chancel, and the
slender emoluments of the Travelling Fellow compelled
him to stop at home. He stayed in residence at Cam-
bridge until the autumn of 1854, when he went to Elveden,
which was his home until the place was sold in 1863 after
the death of his father.

For some years now he had been corresponding on
Natural History subjects, chiefly ornithological, with
naturalists all over the country ; among these may be
mentioned Yarrell, Gould, J. H. Gurney, and Sir William
Jardine, to whom he had become known through his
contributions to the pages of the Zoologist. But his most
important correspondence was with John Wolley. The
two men had been corresponding for some three years,
and in October, 1851, Wolley first called on Newton in his
rooms at Cambridge, after which their acquaintance
ripened into a firm friendship. Wolley's work was

* From " Magdalene College," by E. K. Parnell. (F. E. Robinson & Co.)

JOHN WOLLEY 13

destined to have so profound an influence on that of
Newton, that a short account of his life may fittingly be
given here. He was the eldest son of the Rev. John
Wolley, afterwards vicar of Beeston, Notts, and was
born in 1824. From Eton, where he spent six years, he
went to Trinity College, Cambridge, in 1842. He
graduated in 1846 and in 1847 he went to Edinburgh,
where he studied medicine for three years. His vaca-
tions were devoted to the pursuit of Natural History,
and on his egg-collecting expeditions he gained a remark-
able familiarity with the most remote districts of the
British Islands.

John Wolley's more important travels and ornitho-
logical discoveries may be told in Newton's words : — *

He left England for the North in April, 1853. He had
become persuaded from careful consideration of many
facts that the country between the head of the Gulf of
Bothnia and the Arctic Ocean must be the breeding
place of many birds whose homes were unknown. He
was delayed both at Gottenburg and Stockholm by the
difficulty of getting local information, and was finally
compelled to start knowing very little of what was
required. He went up with the Spring, instead of being
beforehand with it, and his progress was slow.

When he got to Muonioniska he found himself too
late for the eggs of the Birds of Prey, and I now have the
hatched-out shell of a Rough-legged Buzzard's egg,
which was the only bit of such a common species as that
which he procured. In those days no one in England
had an authenticated egg of that bird. It was the same
with Cranes and many others. Siberian Jays (the eggs
then quite unknown) had hatched out long since. He
got a single nest of Temminck's Stint and some 4 or 5
Jack-Snipes' (both unknown in England), about as many
nests of Broad-billed Sandpiper, but that had before

* Letter to J. A. Harvie-Browii, April 7, 1874.

14 EARLY INTEREST IN NATURAL HISTORY

been found. In Ducks he did better, but altogether his
results were meagre. However, he was anything but
discouraged. He resolved to winter in the country and
visit every house within a large district to make inquiries
and invite people to supply his wants. This he did most
effectually, and the following year he had Gyrfalcons',
any number of Buzzards', Shore Larks', and many other
valuable eggs of his own taking. Still Pine Grosbeak,
Siberian Jay, and above all Waxwing, all escaped him.
He came home for 6 weeks in August, 1854, and then
returned for another winter, working as before. In 1855
he pushed on to the Varanger, and then Hudleston and
I joined him. With him as our pioneer we did very
fairly, and returning home by Muonioniska we found
Siberian Jay and Pine Grosbeak had been obtained.

The winter of 1855-6 he was at home ; in spring of /56
he went to (Eland and Gottland,* which proved a failure,
and then pushed on to Muonioniska, where the great
discovery of Waxwing had just been effected. There he
wintered, again in spring made a fresh incursion to the
Varanger — or very near it — got Buffon's Skua, and
finally Smew. Then he returned home, keeping up an
active correspondence with people in Lapland. In 1858
he went to Iceland. Then his health gave way and in
1859 he died. Still his seed bore fruit, and Snowy Owls'
eggs came to me in 1860 or /61 — I forget which.

I believe that not one half of his successes would have
been attained but for his persistently wintering in Lapland
and getting to know all the people of the country. At
the same time I am not going to say that for you it would
be necessary to winter in the Petchora. You have fewer
objects to attain and this extreme measure may not be
necessary. Grey Plover, Little Stint, Curlew Sandpiper,
and Bewick's Swan and Steller's Duck alone demand
your chief attention. He had not only all these to
inquire about, but twice as many besides.

* " Led astray by a statement of Westerland that he had found Larus
minutus breeding in CEland, he wasted a season there ; otherwise he would
most likely have been on the scene when the Waxwing discovery was made.
A. N."

BIRD'S-NESTING IN LAPLAND 15

Wolley's letters from Scandinavia attracted Newton
strongly, and the fauna of northern countries always
interested him, perhaps, more than that of any other
region. Wolley was an extremely accurate and careful
observer, who accepted nothing on hearsay evidence,
with the result that his collections gained greatly in
value from the complete authenticity of every specimen.
The following extract from one of his letters * shows
something of his energetic and painstaking nature and at
the same time gives a description of bird-hunting in
Lapland, which is as true to-day as it was in his time.

To find the marsh birds' nests it is useless to be
alone ; the population here is very scanty, and just the
fortnight that the birds have eggs every man, woman and
child is busy with his own affairs, and laying in everything
he will want for a long winter, so that it was very difficult
to get any one. I had to pay high wages to the people
who went with me to the marshes, and besides to give
them two or three bits of silver for every egg they found.
I worked night and day, often up to my middle in mud
and water, under a scorching sun or in drenching rain,
amidst clouds of gnats of a most greedy and venomous
kind, which made the night more unpleasant than the
day. To manage ten or twelve persons, beaters, etc., is
no easy thing when you are well used to them and they
to their business, but when all your men are quite unused
to the kind of thing, when your Swedish companion can-
not understand your expressions, such as " take a beat,"
' quarter the ground," ' keep the line," when he has to
repeat these to a Finnish interpreter and he again to
explain them to the natives, and when after all you have
to make these natives follow the explanations, it is
both difficult and fatiguing and involves great loss of
time.

Then the places frequented by the birds one want are
few and far between. The people do not know the kinds,

* Dated, July, 1863.

16 EARLY INTEREST IN NATURAL HISTORY

and one had no clue at first to the local names. At one
time I am told of a place, 7 or 8 miles off, where there are
many wading birds ; going there with full forces I find
there are certainly many Curlews. Another time I hear
of a famous lake, 20 miles off, renowned over the country
for birds ; every bird I ask for is to be found there ;
coming to it I find scarcely anything : it is an autumnal
rendezvous for Ducks and Geese.

Mosquitoes, fleas, bugs, midges, dirty houses, no bed-
clothes, no bread, sour milk, reindeer flesh raw and as
hard as a board, are not luxuries. If you want to wash
they bring you the same little sour bowl out of which you
drink. All these little things make a bird-nesting ex-
pedition here very different from one when one leaves a
comfortable English house in the morning to return to it
in the evening. I find myself lose strength and spirits,
so that it requires some resolution to continue my
exertions. Now, however, I am in excellent winter
quarters, a clean house, capital cook, and every necessary,
and if I were to remain here next summer I should do
much more in the bird-nesting way, from the benefit of
experience both as to names, localities, and habits,
besides as to the best mode of keeping oneself in health
and spirits in the wilderness. But I think of going to
Spitzbergen. I am informed that a vessel goes from
Hammerfest occasionally to hunt reindeer and kill
walruses there. In the winter I propose to drive my
pulka with my swift-footed rein over to Alten and make
inquiries, and if I find it feasible, I shall certainly try
what I can do in Spitzbergen.

It was the custom in those days for ornithologists to
attempt to defray part of the cost of their travels by
selling some of their duplicate specimens of skins and
eggs. Newton undertook to dispose of Wolley's speci-
mens, and the annual sales at Stevens' Auction Rooms of
the rarities from Lapland were events which attracted a
crowd of naturalists from all over the country. There

SALES OF EGGS 17

was very keen competition among collectors to secure
specimens of the newly-discovered species, and high
prices were obtained for the eggs of the Waxwing, Pine
Grosbeak, Siberian Jay, etc. : thus £5 105. was paid for
the first egg of the Waxwing, £4 55. for an egg of the Pine
Grosbeak, and 255. for a single egg of the Siberian Jay.
Greatly exaggerated rumours went about concerning the
profits made by these sales. The total amount realised
by Wolley's seven sales from 1853 to 1859 did not exceed
£940, and it is safe to say that the cost of obtaining the
specimens greatly exceeded that sum. In 1860, after
Wolley's death, Newton held another sale of a large
number of his duplicate specimens ; the sum amounted
to about £200, which he devoted to the publication of the
first part of the catalogue of Wolley's collection, the
" Ootheca Wolleyana."

It was in 1855 that Newton made his only journey to
Lapland. With his friend W. Hudleston Simpson * he
crossed the North Sea from Hull to Christiania at the
end of May. It blew half a gale and the ship, " being
much impeded by a railway carriage in the fore part of
the deck," made only four and a half knots an hour, but
Newton alone of all the passengers suffered not at all.
From Christiania the railway extended at that time only
as far as Eidswold, and thence they drove to Trondhjem
in carrioles, being accompanied a part of the way by one
of the earliest mountaineers in Norway, Blackwell,f with
the Chamonix guide, Gideon Balmat. By covering the
last hundred miles into Trondhjem in twenty-eight hours
they arrived just in time to take passage in the weekly
mail steamer to Hammerfest. As they went northward
up the coast all the days and most of the nights were

* Afterwards W. H. Hudleston, F.R.S. ; died 1909.
t Eardley J. Blackwell : made one of the earliest ascents of the
Wetterhorn in 1854.

C

18 EARLY INTEREST IN NATURAL HISTORY

spent on deck in noting birds new to them and in admira-
tion of the fantastic beauty of the Lofotens. At Ham-
merfest they were delayed by gales and snowstorms for
twelve days, which they spent in the very uncomfortable
inn of that unattractive town. On June 16 they passed
the North Cape, and two days later, after visiting Horno,
which was then hostile territory (being in the Province
of Archangel), they landed at Vadso. On the 19th
they were joined by Wolley, who had just returned from
his expedition to Lake Enare and the Patsjoki, where he
had discovered the nest of the Hooper.* He brought
with him a couple of young Sea-Eagles alive and a train
of Jays and Grouse, as well as a mass of bones, skins,
feathers, down, and so forth. Beside the precious
Swan's eggs, he had brought very many more, and the
children of Vadso were waiting for him with all the eggs
they had collected for him during the season, so the three
men set up blowing eggs until five o'clock in the morning,
and it is not surprising to learn that the baker's house
(where they stayed) seemed to have been turned into a
poulterer's shop. In a day or two lodgings were found
for Wolley's live birds, and the party then set off in boats
up the Varanger Fjord, where they remained for a
month. They did not attain the principal object of
their search, the breeding place of Button's Skua, but
they succeeded in finding the nests of many rare and
interesting birds. Newton and Simpson were the first
Englishmen to find and identify the eggs of the Red-
throated Pipit (Anthus cervinus), and they obtained many
others that were new to them, such as Red-necked
Phalarope, Temminck's Stint, Bluethroat, Velvet Scoter,
Turnstone, Shore Lark, and others. They made an
expedition to the Tana River, where Simpson caught

* J. W.'s very graphic account of this discovery may be read in " Ootheca
Wolley ana," vol. ii. p. 495.

JOURNEY THROUGH LAPLAND 19

salmon, whilst Newton accused himself of being the only
Englishman who ever visited that famous river without
the desire to cast a fly.

After investigating the remarkable raised beaches of
the Varanger Fjord, they returned to Hammerfest and
thence went by steamer up the Lyngen Fjord to Skibotn.
That region had been very seldom visited by Englishmen
in those days, and their journey across the peninsula to
the Gulf of Bothnia was considered a veiy creditable
feat.* After crossing the watershed they found boats
awaiting them at Kilpis-jarvi, and in these they descended
the Muonio River to Wolley's headquarters at Muonio-
vara. Nearly a month was spent in collecting and pack-
ing the eggs which Wolley's collectors had obtained for
him. Newton traversed the famous swamp — no light
undertaking for a lame man — to see the spot where the
first Crane's nest had been discovered two years before
and Simpson had good sport with the wild-fowl with
which the Muonio abounds. In September they con-
tinued their journey in boats down the river to Hapa-
randa, whence they returned by way of Stockholm to
England.

Though he was able only once to visit Lapland,
Newton always spoke of it as a sort of ornithological
paradise, and years afterwards, as the present writer can
gratefully testify, he was ready to help and advise
younger naturalists who proposed to follow in his steps.

When Mr. Harvie-Brown returned from a Norwegian
trip in 1871, he advised him to go farther east into a
country which at that time was almost unknown territory
to naturalists.

I met Mr. Alston in London and was very glad to find

* An excellent account of this part of their journey was written by
Simpson for Eraser's Magazine, April, 1856.

20 EARLY INTEREST IN NATURAL HISTORY

you and he had enjoyed your trip to Norway so much.
I hope you will go again to the North, but pray take my
word for it that if you only reach a good high altitude,
the further eastward you go the more you will get. I believe
the land of promise for an oologist is in N. Finland
between the Kemi River and the White Sea. Anything
I can do to further your explorations in that direction
you can entirely command.

East Finmark is nearly as well known as the Scottish
Highlands, you might get something new there just as
you might in the Highlands, but the chances are greatly
against it. Northern Finland is quite an untouched
country.

The Snow Bunting ought to be found without diffi-
culty in Scotland. I never had any trouble in marking
a bird to her nest.*

Three years later Harvie-Brown had an opportunity
of taking Newton's advice, and planned to go farther
east still to the Petchora.

I am delighted to find that the Petchora scheme is
coming off and I envy you not a little. The only species
I can add to your prospective bill of fare is Bewick's
Swan. That and the Curlew Sandpiper seem to me the
most urgent of the desideratissima with which you are
likely to fall in, and I would beseech you to spare no
trouble about them, and not to be discouraged if you do
not get eggs this year, provided you can only ascertain
that these species breed there. Remember how Wolley
worked for years in faith and was rewarded at last. You
will, I am afraid, find it a very hard expedition, and I
hope you will not knock up under the miseries of hunger
and cold. The Samoieds are now I dare say peaceable
enough, but in the days when Wolley was thinking of
going to the Petchora they were reported by the Russians
to be very savage. I don't know that anything on the
fauna of the country has ever been published, certainly

* Letter to J. A. Harvie-Brown, October 28, 1871.

MUSK OX 21

there is no zoology that I could ever find in Keyserling's
" Reise nach Petchora Land," so that all ought to be
interesting and I trust you will make copious notes for
at least a paper in the Ibis., if not for a book.

It would be well to study carefully the diagnostic
characters of Bewick's Swan before you go, so that you
may know it from the Hooper through your glass, if
you cannot get near enough to shoot it. Curlew Sand-
piper with its white rump and red head and neck is
unmistakable, but a breeding plumage skin to show the
natives would not be a bad thing to take with you.*

Persons voyaging to Polar Seas were always appealed
to by him to bring back specimens for the Museum, and
among them was his friend Colonel (then Major) H. W.
Feilden, who served on board H.M.S. Alert in Nares'
Expedition of 1875-6.

When the proceeds of the German Arctic Expedition
were sold at Bremen some time ago we bought a skeleton
of a Musk Ox (bull) supposed to be perfect; the money
was paid and some time elapsed before it was overhauled
— then we found that the bones of the left metacarpus were
wanting ! Can you then among other things secure us
an Extra left fore leg of a Musk Bull, if you fall in with
any ? N.B. — Anything, I am sure, pertaining to Ovibos —
even the dung in a bottle — would be most valuable, as
the poor beast is not long for this world. I do wonder
if this next month will see you cut the Knotty tangle, f

The " knotty tangle " was the question of the possible
discovery of the hitherto unknown breeding-place of the
Knot. Newton had been chaffed by a writer in the
Saturday Review because he had suggested that Knots
might be found breeding on green meadows near Smith
Sound. He begged Feilden to help him out of the scrape,

* Letter to J. A. Harvie- Brown, March 28, 1874.
t Letter to H. W. Feilden, June 21, 1875.

22 EARLY INTEREST IN NATURAL HISTORY

and before the expedition sailed he gave him as a parting
present a knife with the following inscription : —

HOC FERRO

NE MODO ALEXANDRI

SED ALEXANDRI PRECEPTORIS

SECETUR
NODUS *

HENRICO WEMYSS FEILDEN
POLUM PETENTI.

A.N.
* What the Knot is requires no explanation to an Ibis.

As a matter of history, it may be recorded that the
breeding-place of the Knot was discovered during the
course of that expedition. In July an old bird accom-
panied by three nestlings was obtained near the Alert
on Grinnell Land, in 82° 33' N. latitude ; and in the same
month Mr. Chichester Hart, naturalist to H.M.S.
Discovery, obtained in 81° 44' N. latitude a brood of
four young birds, disturbed from the nest. So the
Knotty tangle was cut.

By way of recognition of Newton's services to the
Expedition, in advice to the naturalists and care of the
specimens they obtained, a newly discovered glacier was
named after him by Admiral Sir George Nares. The
Alfred Newton Glacier discharges into the sea on the
west side of Smith Sound in 78° 30' N. latitude, between
the north entrance of Baird Inlet and Leconte Island.

" The compliment paid me by Nares' Expedition is
certainly a great one, though one can hardly look on
a glacier as a very abiding monument, and it suggests
a cold and grinding disposition which I hope is not
mine." f

In 1857 Newton went to the West Indies and visited
the islands of St. Croix and St. Thomas, in the former of

t Letter to A. C. Smith, March 26, 1879.

HUMMING-BIRDS 23

which one of his brothers, Francis Rodes, was living.
He made many interesting observations on the birds of
the islands and afterwards, with his brother Edward,
contributed a valuable paper on the Birds of St. Croix
to the first volume of the Ibis. He was strongly attracted
by the beauty of the tropical fauna, which he saw then
for the first time-

I think it is quite worth crossing the Atlantic to see
Humming-birds. No pen can describe and no pencil
depict the suddenness with which the little fairy appears
before you, the rapidity with which, on wings whirring
like a cotton mill, he visits flower after flower, and then
when you least expect it, away he shoots in pursuit of a
rival. All this while (about thirty seconds) you are
holding your breath for fear of blowing him away.
However, his glittering feathers are quite unseen by men
on such occasions ; one may catch a glimpse of their
sheen when he happens to mount aloft on a dead tama-
rind bough and draw his primaries through his mandibles,
but then it just depends upon whether he and you are
relatively in the right position for the light.*

An interesting note relating to Humming-birds is
recorded in a letter written to his brother : —

I think the only other ornithological occurrence of
interest that I have met with is that the other day I saw
a Humming-bird fairly caught in a spider's web. The
bird came into my room and went furiously spinning
round and round the ceiling; at length it touched a
pretty big spider's web, and was quite powerless. The
net was, luckily for the bird, an old, deserted one and
very much tattered ; therefore after hanging for some
seconds, if not minutes, a series of violent struggles
released it. I caught the bird subsequently and found
its feathers quite bound up with the web. It has been
often asserted by the old writers that Humming-birds

* Letter to T. Southwell, December 8, 1857.

24 EARLY INTEREST IN NATURAL HISTORY

get caught in spiders' webs, and as often doubted.
Gosse declares that he is sure that no web could ever for
a moment stop the flight of any, even the least, species
of Humming-bird ; now here I have proof positive to the
contrary. It might be said that the bird was already
fatigued by its attempts to get out of the room ; but
then it must be remembered on the other hand that the
web was an old one, deserted and in rags ; had it been in
good order I much question whether the bird could have
escaped.

From the West Indies Newton went to New Orleans,
and thence to Boston and New York, where a serious
illness prevented him from carrying out an extensive
tour in the United States and Canada. But his visit to
America, though it was never repeated, gave him a
cordial liking for American men and institutions, and it
was the beginning of an acquaintance with the leading
naturalists of the country, Agassiz, Baird, Coues, and
many others, with whom he kept up a life-long corre-
spondence.

Another circumstance connected with this journey is
that he had the satisfaction of " teaching young America
how to blow eggs." Instead of the old method of
blowing eggs with two holes, he explained to them the
use of the drill and blowpipe, by means of which the
contents are removed through a single hole in the side of
the egg. His paper, entitled " Suggestions for Forming
Collections of Birds' Eggs," was published in their
Miscellaneous Collections by the Smithsonian Institution,
in 1860.

Even when he was most busily occupied, Newton
always found time to write to an ever-increasing number
of friends in England and elsewhere, to make arrange-
ments for the annual meeting of ornithologists and to
negotiate exchanges of specimens and so on. One of his

VISIT TO AMERICA 25

most intimate friends and frequent correspondents was
H. B. Tristram,* who had just at this time returned from
a very successful expedition to Algeria.

Boston,
September 1, 1857.

MY DEAR TRISTRAM,

I can only afford you just time enough and
this scrap of paper to express my exultation at your safe
return from the most unprecedented campaign that
Algeria has ever been the theatre of. The glories of
African generals of all nations and times sink to nothing
when compared with yours ; Sesostris, Marius, Alexander,
Menon, Abercromby, with all the moderns, Bugeaud, Sir
Harry Smith, and Pelissier, are nobodies. Moses only
spoiled the Egyptians, but to have carried off such a
booty under the noses of French naturalists is a much
greater triumph, and the Algerians seem to me 'to have
expiated all their past cruelties to Christian slaves by
the way they have assisted you. In the plenitude of
your wealth, however, I hope you will not forget one who
on whichever side of the Atlantic and the Tropic of Cancer
he has been, has been always wishing for your success ;
not, though, that I can offer you anything more like
" reciprocity ' than that which under the same name
Brother Jonathan holds out to the Blue-nosed fishermen.
But I am one of those who will readily hoard up quicquid
de Libycis verritur areis. I have seen Dr. Brewer and
his collection, of neither is much to be said ; the Dr. is
reserved to an astonishing degree for a Yankee, and has
evidently never enjoyed anything like those glorious
days of last September when you met me at Cambridge,
the memory of those talks de omnibus avibus, etc., has
cheered me many a time for the last eight months, when
with the exception of two hours with Downs at Halifax
(a real out and outer) I have not met with a soul who
could converse on the subject. His collection is ex-
tremely moderate considering the scope of it and what

* Canon of Durham, D.D., F.R.S. : died 1906.

26 EARLY INTEREST IN NATURAL HISTORY

must have been great opportunities, the only egg I
coveted a Hooded Merganser's, of which you have one.

What is to be done about an Oological conference
this year ? You will be the great difficulty, or rather
I should say the time and place that will suit you. I
trust sincerely your health is better.

Yours most truly,

ALFRED NEWTON.

Another of Newton's early correspondents, and later
a life-long friend, was John Henry Gurney, of Norwich.
From 1844, when they became acquainted by means of
a Sea Eagle, until Gurney 's death in 1890, they kept up
a frequent correspondence, mostly about birds of prey,
of which Mr. Gurney's famous collection is now in the
Norwich Museum. He was also a generous contributor
to the Museum at Cambridge.

CHAPTER III

VISIT TO ICELAND

IN the year following his first visit to the West Indies
Newton went with John Wolley to Iceland. He had for
a long time cherished the idea that the Great Auk, or
Gare-fowl as he always preferred to call it, might still
survive on some of the skerries off the coast of Iceland.
Wolley, always enthusiastic, was very sanguine of success,
and in the spring of 1858 they resolved to put their
theory to the test. The story of their journey is told
in two letters to Edward Newton : —

Reykjavik, May 2, 1858.

I left Elveden on April 20, and reached Edinburgh
on the 21st, where I found Wolley just arrived and in
good force. The next morning we got off about 9.30.
A perfectly calm day, warm for the time of year, but
misty ; the Firth of Forth like glass ; some common sea-
birds about but not many, besides Velvet Scoters and
Gannets. At sun-down, 8 p.m., we were north of Aber-
deen. The next morning (being off the Pentland Firth)
was just as still, and we made good speed ; towards
afternoon we sighted Fair Island, lying between Orkney
and Shetland, and soon after saw the lighthouse on N.
Ronaldshay, the land being invisible ; later still we
sighted Foula, which we only lost about dark. Only
common sea-birds about. On the 24th I saw Fulmars
from my port-hole window before I was up. A few
Wheatears joined us and a couple of Pipits appeared.
About 1 p.m. we made Sudero, one of the Faroerne ;
before long we encountered two Great Skuas — the first I

27

28 VISIT TO ICELAND

had ever seen — and soon after four dropped anchor at
Thorshaven, the capital. Here we landed a good many
passengers, for we had so far been rather inconveniently
crowded ; among them the Stiftsampteraand or Governor,
whose arrival was the cause of a deal of gunning. Wolley
and myself went ashore wth the mails, consisting of
twenty letters (the first post received this year from
Denmark). We walked about and viewed the town and
suburbs. All the houses are covered with grass, but such
as we entered seemed comfortable. They are built with-
out the slightest reference to the inequalities of the
ground, but with regular though extremely narrow
streets. We found the people sowing their barley, turn-
ing up the ground with an instrument, the inventor of
which must have had a marrow-spoon in his mind which
he enlarged to the dimensions of a cricket bat. Spade
it can hardly be called ; yet even this elaborate imple-
ment is not required in reality, for there being little or no
subsoil in Fsero, about an inch and a half is as much as
seems to be dug up. All the male population seem
dressed in uniform, a brown homespun loose jacket, some-
times with silver buttons ; a striped woollen cap, the end
hanging down ; knee breeches, worsted stockings and
shoes without soles, built on the lines of a moccasin or a
Turkish slipper. One of the Sysselmaand, Miiller by
name, is a great " pal " of Wolley 's and he entertained
us to supper before we left, which we did about midnight,
the moon and the high latitude between them making it
quite light. On shore we only saw some Hooded Crows,
a Wheatear and Golden Plover. As we left Fgero we got
a tolerable Atlantic roll which continued increasing for
the rest of our voyage. We now found our party reduced
considerably, not only by the desertion we had experi-
enced at Faero (one of whom was a most extraordinary-
looking German Professor, whose week-old beard and
bear-like projecting snout did him with a most grotesque
expression endue,) but by other causes which kept a
considerable number of Icelanders, both male and female,
to their berths. Wolley, however, behaved remarkably

VOYAGE TO ICELAND 29

well and was never fairly under the weather. We had
two Scotchmen on board ; they were from Glasgow and
were, and are, prospecting to see if they can open any
advantageous trade. Both of them good sort of fellows.
Wolley would not have it, but I am sure I saw an Alca
alle on this day ; the next day we both saw two, all
appeared to be in good summer dress ; the first of the
species, of course, he or I had ever seen. We now had
rather roughish weather with rain. Lots of Fulmars
about. In the afternoon we fancied we saw land, which
towards evening it clearly proved to be. Just about sun-
down, somewhere towards 9 o'clock, a Wheatear came
on board, and evidently wished to pass the night with us,
but I doubt if the poor beast succeeded in doing so.
Next morning we passed the Westmann Islands about
2 o'clock, but it was thick when I got on deck and land
was not visible ; soon after we sighted it again and never
again lost it. About noon we passed the celebrated Meal
Sack, but we must have been nearly two miles from it.
It is certainly well named, for in one direction it has
very much the sort of look of a sack half filled, with the
sides turned down, and I do not doubt but that in the
season it is white enough on the top. On the landward
side runs out a low shelf or rock, whereon the Greak Auk
is supposed to have bred. Outside at the distance of about
four times its diameter lies a small low skerry, which had
a very inviting appearance, but the water is said at
times to go right over it.

There were a great quantity of Gannets and Fulmars
about, also Kitti wakes and the common Alcidce. We
looked of course for the Geier Fugle, but in vain. It
came on to blow pretty smartly, and I think our Captains
(for we had both an English and a Danish one on board,
who will I take it have a real good cat and dog life of it
during the summer) were glad when we let go our anchor
off this place.

We were much amused at an enthusiastic young girl
rushing up from below as we passed a solitary grass-
covered house, and in spite of the traces of so much

30 VISIT TO ICELAND

suffering on her face, exclaiming, ' ' Ah, there is Ness !
there was I born ! '

Just before we anchored I had a good view of a
Pomarine Skua. Eider-ducks, Eavens and Grt. B. b.
Gulls about. When we landed we came straight up to
the Hotel or Club as they call it, where we obtained
lodgings and where we still are, pretty well accommo-
dated, faring much better than I had expected, though
we have to eat both Eider Ducks and Merganser. The
next morning we called on the Rector of the Native
School, from whom we then and since experienced much
civility and coffee. Afterwards we did ourselves the
honour of visiting the Governor, Count Trampe, nephew
of the man of that name who was here in Hooker's time,
and was taken prisoner by Jorgensen. With him also
we got on very well, and between these two we now know
nearly every one of consideration in the place. The next
three days it blew a great gale ; so much so that we were
unable to get our heavy baggage from the steamer ; but
this was nothing to the awful night we had on Friday
when we went to eat a " bit of bread " with the Rector.
Three or four of the biggest swells were asked to meet
us, and a terrible quantity of claret and punch had to
be drunk ; however, we got home after two in the
morning, but I can honestly say quite sober, and thanks
to the purity of the drinks were none the worse the next
day. We called on the apothecary, who has the reputa-
tion of being an ornithologist, but found nothing of
interest in the few skins he had — Iceland Falcon, Anas
Barrovii, A. histrionica, etc. We saw a picture of the
last Great Auk ; probably the one seen by Pliny Miles
and Mrs. Bushby, a wretched performance ; this bird
was said to have been taken at the Meal Sack in 1846.

We have since seen a man who lives at Kirkjuvogr,
the nearest village to the Meal Sack. He has made four
trips there, the last in /56, when no Geier Fugles were
found ; on the previous occasions, 24, 7, and 2 were
obtained. We are to go to him in about a fortnight,
and then to make the expedition in two boats. I do not

DELAY AT REYKJAVIK 31

think there is much risk, if, as we shall do, we wait for
favourable weather. We are now in treaty with a
Divinity Student who comes from that part of the
country to make a special journey to the Eastern Geier
Fugle skerry for us, as it is impossible for us to visit both
that and the Cape Reykjanes locality within the necessary
time. It will be an expensive business, but it is, I am
inclined to think, the best card in the pack, and one I
should never forgive myself for not playing, if afterwards
it should turn out the birds were there. It is very doubt-
ful if this rock, lying as it does 40 miles out, has been
visited for a hundred years.

This fellow, by name Magnussen, will not be back by
the time the steamer sails next. He only came to us this
evening, and we have hardly considered the terms, but I
think we shall engage with him. He is highly recom-
mended by the Rector, but there is some difficulty about
his going, as he ought to pass an examination at the
College here just about the time ; but the Rector has
promised to see if that necessity can be avoided, so
sensibly do they regard such matters here. Only fancy
at Cambridge the Vice-Chancellor letting a man off his
Little-Go because he was wanted to go and look for a
Great Bustard's nest ! ! ! But Herr Rector Jonsen is a
real good fellow. The Land-Physic us, Herr Hjaldalin,
is to go with us to Kirkjuvogr, and we are to take as
guide Geier Zoega, the man Bushby recommended. I
very much want to go first to the Geysers, as nothing
ornithological can yet be done (for I should think nothing
but Iceland Falcon has eggs now, and we must give up
hope of taking any ourselves as they do not breed within
many days' journey of this), and we may afterwards be
hurried for time ; but Wolley requires gentle managing,
he is too fond of delaying things.

May 3.

We have just heard that the steamer is positively to
sail to-night, so I must make haste to finish my letter,
especially as a learned professor of the Icelandic tongue
is expected every minute, to give us our second lesson in

32 VISIT TO ICELAND

his language, and Wolley is studying his task, which is a
Saga and seems to be written intentionally for beginners,
as it opens, " There was a man and his name was Grim."
The pronunciation is the most difficult thing I ever heard,
it beats Finnish into fits, and the spelling seems to be no
guide to it. I want to know a few words as up the
country there will be no one who can speak Danish. We
have a disagreeable wet day, but altogether the weather
is better than I expected it would be, though we have
had a Greenland gale with snow, hard frosts several
nights, and ice to bear a stone. A good-sized lake, close
to the house and the town, has been twice frozen since
we have been here. Round its shores I have seen Red-
shanks, Ringed Plover and White Wagtail. Wheatears
are seen among the buildings of the town, and close by
among the small enclosures of stone walls are Snow Bunt-
ings and Golden Plover. Ptarmigan are not found near ;
there is supposed to be a man now gone in search of some
for us, but I cannot help thinking he is staying at home.
Every Icelandic (as distinguished from Danish) house
has attached to it a building for drying fish, and hanging
at the door of each is generally to be seen a bundle of
roughly prepared skins of Gulls, mostly Kittiwakes ; but
I found in one lot a young and old Iceland or Glaucous
Gull, I could not make out which, as I had no means
of ascertaining the size. I have done nothing yet about
getting ponies, in fact there is not much use in doing so
until one wants to go somewhere, as there would only be
the trouble of having to look after them in the town, and
fodder is not only dear but hardly to be got. Henderson,
one of the Scotchmen I before mentioned, has bought
about 18, however, which he takes back with him ; they
are all in the most miserable condition, but with hair so
long they look like bears.

Kkkjuvogr, near Cape Reyk janes,
S.W. of Iceland,

May 28, 1858.

Here we are at one of the nearest places to the
Great Auk Islands, and here we have been for a week.

BIRDS AT REYKJAVIK 33

We left Reykjavik on the 19th, having stayed there all
the time from our arrival, the spring being so backward
that it was said to be impossible to get grass for the
horses, and thereby travelling was rendered very difficult.
Of course, it was a great bore being weatherbound in the
metropolis as it was not lively, and a very bad place
ornithologically speaking. Besides this we were almost
in a chronic state of intoxication from the unnecessary
amount of hospitality we had to endure, but as it was all
meant as civilly as possible one had nothing to do but
abide it, and certainly no people could have put them-
selves in the way of doing all we wished (with this one
exception) than everybody we met. I told you before
of the readiness with which they allowed Mr. Eric Mag-
nussen to start off for us to the Eastern Great A. rocks,
and in due time the young man left us in very good
heart, and I hope he has now arrived at the point on the
coast opposite to it. What the result of his journey may
be, we may not know for another six weeks. He was
also commissioned to look after some Falcon's eggs, but
we thought it best as he was not an ornithologist not to
embarrass him with other subjects. Reykjavik, as I said
before, is a very bad bird place, and very little, if anything,
of any consequence breeds in the immediate neighbour-
hood, excepting perhaps Glaucous Gull, which is said to
be on some of the islands in the Fjord, but these we could
not find any trustworthy person to look for, and of course
taken by any one else, they would be of no value, for
there are quite enough Grt. Black backs about. The
only birds I saw of them up to the present time have
been young ones, and the same with Iceland Gulls.
Several people in the place make a sort of trade in selling
skins and we bought some at moderate prices, but
nothing of any rarity. One fellow had a small immature
Gull killed last winter, which we got from him. I am
not sure whether it is L. ridibundus or not, but none of
that group have been yet found in the country. We got
also nearly a dozen falcons' skins, nearly all Icelanders
but one or two Greenlanders. For a real white Greenlander

34 VISIT TO ICELAND

they charge as much as £1, so that we did not go
deeply into them. Harlequins and Barrow's Ducks are
moderate, but there is no great stock of them. I also got
a few birds skinned by a good woman who does them
very fairly well, and very reasonably. Young Glaucous,
Adult Black-backed Gulls, White-fronted Goose, Great
Northern Diver, etc., besides some Ptarmigan ; these
have not yet got much out of their winter plumage,
though, by the way, I have not seen any fresh-killed the
last week or ten days. Thus much of our stay at Reyk-
javik ; we left it, as I said before, on the 19th with Geier
Zoega (the man recommended by Bushby) as our guide,
in company with the Land Physicus, — a sort of Govern-
ment Doctor, — who was going his rounds to look after
lepers. He is the man whom Ld. Dufferin calls the
' cheeriest of Doctors," and very rightly so, as he is a
real good fellow. We hired horses for this expedition,
as grass is so scarce we could hardly expect to feed them
here, and in addition to this the time of our stay here
was, and is, so uncertain. We had some difficulty in
accomplishing about 30 miles English the first day,
owing to the badness of the ponies' condition and of the
road ; the Doctor, who is a very big man, had three of
his own for his own riding and they all had a benefit of
it. I rode one animal all the way except the last few
miles. Wolley had two. We had besides in company
the Doctor's guide (who was also Ld. DurTerin's and to
whom we brought a whip from Ld. D.) and a Veterinary
surgeon who is sent here to cure the scab, which is killing
all the sheep ; so that we had medical accommodation
for man and beast. The Vet., by the way, got a very
nasty fall, the ground giving under his pony, who came
on the top of him.

The greater part of the way lay over streams of lava,
all the productions of some one or other of the half-dozen
or so respectable-looking volcanoes whose cones break
the horizon to the eastward of us. These lava streams
vary very much in their character ; some are tolerably
smooth, or look like dried coal-tar that has run out ;

LAVA AND MOSSES 35

but others are peaked and jagged in the most fantastic
way you can imagine ; anyhow, each stream seemed as
we came to it to be worse to pass than the last. The
road sometimes goes over the stuff, at others winding in
and out, up and down, in fissures and faults of it, where
generally is collected a foot or two of soft dry sand,
which does not render it a less " hard road to travel." A
good deal of the lava is grown over with mosses, of which
there seems to be a great number of species ; one of the
commonest I never saw before, it is very soft and long,
dark green, but with a thick white down which gives it
the appearance of wool, and this covering so much of
the ground and rocks, when contrasted with the dark
lava on which it grows, makes the whole scene look more
like a good photograph with its lights and shadows well
brought out than anything else ; certainly a photograph
would be the only thing to give an idea of the look of
one of these places. Occasionally a little heather or
cranberry, and even birch (six inches high, not more)
grows amongst this desolation, and there may be heard
and seen the Redwing, singing " tut-tut-tut-tut " just as
he does in Lapland, but here being nearly the only song
bird it does not sound so monotonous. One sees, too, a
good many Snow Buntings, and they have a pretty song.
In fact, these with Raven, White Wagtail, Wheatear and
Titlark are the only passerine birds in Iceland. Ravens
are tamer even than the ones at home and far more
impudent.

Further on on our inarch we came to a waterless dis-
trict, which did not improve the going of the horses (good
water is scarce all over the country, even here it is much
too salt to drink for pleasure ; perhaps it is why the
Icelanders prefer stronger liquors), but we finally arrived
at Keblavik, where we passed the night at a very respect-
able place, and stopped there the next day, the Doctor
having to visit some of his leprous patients, and we not
being in any hurry waited for him. At dinner we had
Turnstones and Purple Sandpipers, as we found after-
wards by asking to see their heads.

36 VISIT TO ICELAND

On the 21st we set out and came on here, but by a
long round as we wished to see a priest who lives close to
Skagen, and some other people who were supposed to
know about Great Auk. They were duly examined and
their depositions taken. On our way we saw a great
many Turnstones, a few Dunlins and Sanderlings (of the
latter I shot a 9> tne ovary backward, and in a very
moderate state of plumage) and some Red-necked Phala-
ropes. We passed some ponds whereon Faber says he
found Grey Phalarope breeding, though he did not get
their eggs. We got two fellows to dig at a rubbish heap,
where an old man said he remembered seeing Great Auks'
bones, but we found nothing but fishes' remains. We
finally arrived here late in the evening and saw a beautiful
sight on the shore ; three Iceland Gulls, young, of course,
sitting on the water close to the landing-place, as tame
as possible ; as many Red-necked Phalaropes swimming
about in a little bay of their own, hardly larger than a
hip-bath ; Purple Sandpipers creeping about on the rocks
like rats, and a vast number of Turnstones ; some of
these, too, were running about among the houses on the
short warren-like turf with Golden Plover, just as you
see Blackbirds and Thrushes on a lawn in England. Since
we have been here we have done but little in the bird way.
We have not yet had a sufficiently calm day to admit of
our going to sea, though one morning we were on the
point of starting when our leader, who has been the
foreman of most of the later expeditions to the rocks,
decided, and wisely as it turned out, that it would not
do. Our arrangements are completed ; we are to have
two 10-oar boats for greater security, and 16 men in
each, so that some may rest ; thus with ourselves and
Zoega there will be 35 souls embarked on the enterprise.
With these precautions, I think the risk is reduced to a
minimum. The information which Wolley has acquired
amounts to about this. In old times the true Geirfug-
lasker was the place visited, and no one thought of going
to the Meal Sack (Eldey) until a boat was seen to
land there from a " yacht " (i.e. cutter), and then an enter-

BREEDING-PLACE OF GREAT AUK 37

prising fellow went there and took 8 Great Auks out of a
considerable number, the greater part of which escaped
as the men did not know the dodge of catching them,
which after all amounts only to going very quietly.
Shortly after this, in the spring of 1830, a submarine
eruption took place, and the true Geirfuglasker sank
(whether any part of it is still above the surface is doubt-
ful). Since then the Meal Sack has only been visited and
with varying success ; one year (probably 1831) 24
were taken there and their skins sold to merchants at
Keblavik. In 1846, our present landlord and leader
went to the Meal Sack and took two birds ; one egg — if
not two — was seen but was accidentally broken, and we
cannot make out that the bird has since been seen by
any one. The rock has been since visited at least twice,
one year in August, which was, of course, far too late to
find the bird, and last year people went but were unable
to land ; the leader of that expedition is extremely
anxious to go again this year, though he declares he saw
nothing last time. It seems pretty certain that the bird
is very irregular in its visits, sometimes keeping away
for several years in succession, so that there is still just a
hope. When Faber was here some thirty years ago, he
cruised for three days off the old Geirfuglasker ; they
were unable to land, but he says he could see every bird
on the rock and there was not a Gare-fowl among them ;
now it is clear that long after his time there were several
successful captures made there, and it has happened in
the same way at the Meal Sack. It is very singular that
we cannot make out that more than half a dozen, if so
many, eggs have been taken here within the last thirty
years. The merchants, though they have given large
sums for the birds, have never cared much for the eggs,
and it is a mystery to us where all the eggs have come
from that are in collections, unless indeed they have
been from the Eastern islet to which Mr. Magnussen has
gone, and where they may have been obtained by French
fishing vessels, of whom there are a great number on
that coast. All accounts agree in saying that on land

38 VISIT TO ICELAND

the bird is blind and only gets its sight when it is in the
water, but it has capital ears. Of course, there is some
mistake here. In the water it swims deep with its head
cocked up, and does not keep dipping its bill as Razor-
bills and Guillemots do. Some old fellows say that there
are always as many eggs found as birds, which can only
be accounted for by the supposition that the cocks and
hens relieve each other. It is therefore a point of con-
siderable importance whether two eggs or one were found
in 1846, and we have been unable to get satisfactory
evidence respecting it. If as one man says there were
two, there must have been other birds out fishing at the
time the boat landed, and then there is a strong pre-
sumption that the bird was not exterminated in that
year. Wolley is much more sanguine about success than
I am, and I think more than he has a right to be ; but
at the same time I am not more desponding than I have
always been about it.

June 2.

The steamer passed Reykjanes the afternoon before
last. I am in hopes that I may get letters to-day ; but
people have such odd notions of the necessity of doing
anything at once in this country that I have my doubts.
I forgot to say that on the 24th largeish flocks of Knots
arrived, which were increased on the following day. They
were very wild and it was only after several trials that
we shot one, which proved to be a male and well advanced
in plumage. Yesterday they had diminished in numbers,
and to-day I have not seen one. By far the greater part
of the Turnstones and Purple Sandpipers too have gone ;
so also Dunlin and Golden Plover, and I have not seen a
Sanderling now for nearly a week. I suspect Grey
Phalarope breeds hereabouts occasionally; a man says he
found a " Randbrustling ' nest on an islet here once,
and this name though properly applicable to the Knot,
is also used for the other Redbreast, and this man spoke
of its swimming in the water like " Odin's Hani " (Red-
necked Phi.). We have again tried digging for Great
Auks' bones, but without success. We are endeavouring

GREAT AUK 39

to get some live White- winged Gulls for the Zoological,
but the brutes are very wary, and do not seem inclined
to take either a baited hook or to get into a snare.

On Sunday (the 30th) I saw a fine Buffon's Skua here,
and yesterday evening a man sent us one from Keblavik
that he had shot. I have tried several times in vain to
find Snow Buntings' nests ; they are now building, but
they do not seem to have a good heart in the matter, for
often after picking up a nice bit of wool or a feather they
let it drop again before long. I succeeded some days ago
in watching a White Wagtail to its nest, but there are no
eggs yet. The only eggs I have seen, are one nest of
Lesser Black-backed Gull and three Golden Plovers'
which have been brought in. The weather still looks far
from being settled, and it seems as if we might be here
at least another fortnight. What our future plans may
be I cannot say at all. Of course, the great object is to
reach Great Auk, but unless we soon get the attempt
made it will be of no use going northward, and then we
must devote ourselves to Grey Phalarope in this corner
of the island. We have sent to the westward to Oddi,
for Gooses' eggs, as Faber says Anser albifrons is there
only.

I shall certainly try and get home by the middle of
August, though I think Wolley will very likely stay
longer.

Elveden, August 16, 1858.

The result, then, in short was nothing. Not one day
of the whole two months we were at Kirkjuvogr was the
sea ever sufficiently calm to have allowed us to land,
even had we gone out, and we have come back knowing
no more than when we started whether the Great Auk
is living or dead.

CHAPTER IV

THE GREAT AUK-

THE journey to Iceland, though it resulted in no definite
knowledge as to the continued existence of the Gare-fowl,
so far from discouraging Newton proved to be the
beginning of a prolonged investigation of the natural
history, distribution, and remains of that most remarkable
bird. The many days that they spent in enforced
idleness in Iceland were occupied by Newton and Wolley
in examining a score or more of witnesses, fishermen and
sailors, who had visited the breeding-places of the Gare-
fowl and had been present on the occasions when the
birds had been killed or captured. The result of their
investigations was published * by Newton after Wolley's
death. An interesting point, and one to be greatly
deplored, which they discovered in the course of their
inquiry, was that the extermination of the bird had been
greatly hastened by the action of the European museums
in offering large sums for their skins and eggs. Discussing
the probable fate of the bird, Newton wrote j* :-

As to the extinction of the Great Auk, if it is extinct,
I think it has been mainly accomplished by human
means. The first decided blow, from which probably
the race never rallied, must have been that delivered by
the crew of a strange vessel who about 45 years ago,
while lying becalmed off Cape Reykjanes, landed on
the Geirfuglasker and committed an enormous slaughter.

* " Abstract of Mr. J. Wolley's Researches in Iceland respecting the
Gare-fowl or Great Auk (Alca impennis, Linn.)," Ibis, October, 1861.
t Letter to T. Southwell, Esq., August 30, 1858. Elveden.

40

EXTERMINATION OF GREAT AUK 41

They loaded their boat with birds, among which Gare-

fowls were in no inconsiderable number, leaving yet as

many more on the island which they had killed but

could find no room for. I saw a man who was present on

this occasion. Some 18 years later the Geirfuglasker

sank beneath the waves in a volcanic disturbance of the

sea's bottom, and about that time a few birds, the

descendants probably of those who had survived the

great massacre, were found on an island lying nearer

the mainland, but still only to be reached with difficulty.

Under the influence of the " Almighty Dollar " (though

in Iceland it is not worth 4/2) these poor birds were

persecuted, their eggs plundered and their necks broken

to supply the demand which Museums were then creating.

And so the number dwindled, until in 1844, the only

two then to be seen were taken, their egg broken (the

shell left on the rock) and their skins shipped to Europe.

I do not think there is any good evidence of the bird

being seen since that time ; but I confess I do not give

it quite up, nor shall I for the next five or six years,

though the places suitable for its breeding station must

be very few in number. The coast of Iceland is well

known, and as Iceland is the most northern limit of the

bird's range, it is useless trying further towards the Pole.

The east coast of Greenland is encumbered by ice, and

Labrador is nearly as well known as Iceland.

Wolley died in the year following their return to
England, and Newton never found an opportunity of
repeating his visit to Iceland, but from that time he
began to collect every scrap of information * relating to
the Gare-fowl and to prepare a complete list | of all the
existing remains of the bird — eggs, skins, and bones. On
his journeys about England and the Continent he visited
every public and private collection which possessed a

* ''The Gare-fowl and its Historians," Natural History Review, October,
1865.

t " On Existing Remains of the Gare-fowl (Alca impennis)," The Ibis,
April, 1870.

42 THE GREAT AUK

Gare-fowl and made careful notes of its history. In
John Wolley's collection of eggs, which was bequeathed
to him, were two eggs of the Gare-fowl : these formed
the nucleus of his own famous collection of seven eggs,
which are now in the University Museum at Cambridge.
It is hardly necessary to say that the eggs were sold in
those days far below the enormous prices they fetch
nowadays, but there was a good deal more of romance
about it then than there is now in bidding at auction for
an egg, every point in whose history for the last fifty
years is known. Mr. Gould bought an egg at a toyshop
in Regent Street for ten pounds, and, thinking it to be
a coloured model, sold it again a few days later. Mr.
Yarrell bought an egg in Paris for two francs !

The story of Newton's first purchase is graphically
told in a letter to Canon Tristram : —

I dread the consequences of some news I have to
impart, especially as regards Salvin and the Godmans.
However, it is a punishment on them for their base deser-
tion of me, and a reward to me for my patience under
adversity. In going about London this very wet day I
have picked up the greatest prize an English Oologist
can meet with. I stumbled on the scent of it in the
subterranean regions of Bloomsbury, and after a brilliant
burst in a hansom ran it to ground under the shadow of
St. Mary-le-Strand, a locality already sacred to the gentle
memories of poor old Salmon and his great egg. The
long and short is I have to-day purchased a Great Auk's
egg, one whose existence was previously unknown to me.
I felt bound to rescue this Andromeda from being
chained in the sunshine of Gardner's window, but I
must confess she is not remarkable for her good looks,
though I have seen worse, and I am glad to say her
antecedents are likely to prove extremely interesting.

I expect to hear of Salvin and Percy Godman embrac-
ing and then leaping off the top of Snoehaetten, and of
Fred's drowning himself in the Lake of Lucerne through

BUYING GREAT AUK'S EGG 43

envy. Poor fellows ; but what could one do ? Is a
Great Auk's egg to be suffered to be pilloried in Oxford
Street exposed to the contemptuous gaze of the cads of
Holborn ? Ho ! St. Geirfowl to the rescue !

Of the price no man knoweth save - — and myself ;
all I can say is that sentimental oologising is expensive,
and may that consideration comfort my absent brothers
of the B.O.U.*

The antecedents of that egg were, as Newton sup-
posed, extremely interesting and not altogether reputable.
When he first saw it, the egg bore a paper label, and the
owner, Mr. Calvert, showed Newton a number of other
eggs bearing similar labels, which he said he had bought
recently at the sale of the Natural History part of the
Museum of the United Service Institution. But the
Great Auk's egg, though he thought it came from the
same collection, he said he had bought from some one
else a fortnight before.

I told him that I had learned from Mr. Leadbeater
that there was no such thing in the collection, but he
replied that the sale was so badly managed that whole
boxes, full of odds and ends, were sold without examina-
tion, and this agreed also with Mr. Leadbeater's account.
It ended in my coining to terms with Mr. Calvert ; I
was to have the egg conditionally on his informing me
whence he obtained it, and he was to keep it for me till
my return from the Continent, whither I was intending
to proceed that night — I paying a deposit upon it. On
September 4 I called by appointment to redeem the
egg, and upon my paying the price agreed upon, it was
handed over to me by Mr. Calvert, who informed me
that he had it from one Westall, of Porchester or Portland
Terrace, Bayswater — he could not recollect which. I
complained that this was not according to our agreement,
for that he had promised to give me the person's address.
I lost no time, however, in writing to each of the places

* Letter to H. B. Tristram, August 18, 1860.

44 THE GREAT AUK

he had named, but received no reply. Subsequently I
wrote to Captain Burgess, the Secretary of the United
Service Institution, to obtain the address of Captain
Vidal, whose name was on the label attached to the egg,
to whom I also applied ; but that officer having taken
up his abode in Canada, it was not till the following
summer that I received any reply. When it did come,
it was dated Moon River, Canada West, June 12, 1861,
and was to the effect that he had never given a Great
Auk's egg to the United Service Museum.

Later in the same year, November 7, 1861, the
Council of the Linnsean Society accepted the bequest of
Mr. Salmon's collection of eggs, which they had declined
some time previously on account of certain conditions
attached to its acceptance.

Soon after it was found that no Great Auk's egg was
contained in it, and in its place was a Swan's rudely
spotted and blotched with ink. The conclusion then was
not difficult to draw. It is obvious, however, that with
the view of putting a purchaser on the wrong scent, a
label had been removed from some egg out of the United
Service Museum and affixed to the present specimen.
Whether the substitution was effected with the know-
ledge or connivance of the executor, there is no evidence
to show, nor can I say whether he may not have had a
perfect right to part with this or any other specimen
before handing over the collection to the Linnsean Society.
He certainly attempted to make a bargain with the
Society for it, and I suppose felt justified in doing so.
Mr. Calvert became possessed of Mr. Salmon's Egg-
Catalogue, which he subsequently sold to Mr. Edward
Bidwell, when it was found that the leaf containing the
specimen of the Great Auk had been removed ! The
mutilated volume was transferred by Mr. Bidwell to the
Linnsean Society in 1891.*

The doubtful origin of the egg and the questionable

* " Ootheca Wolleyana," pp. 373-374.

TEN GREAT AUKS' EGGS 45

honesty of one of its late owners was a subject of trouble
to Newton, as is seen from an interesting footnote
attached to the description of the egg in the " Ootheca
Wolleyana," p. 376 :-

It would be absurd of me to ignore the fact that
persons there are, even among my friends, who have
been inclined to think that I was guilty of some sharp
practice in possessing myself of this egg. I trust that
the plain statement of facts fully given above will remove
any misconception on that score. Both before and since
the transaction, eggs of the Gare-fowl have turned up in
a manner the most unexpected. While I was engaged
with Mr. Calvert, Mr. Moore, of the Liverpool Museum,
entered the shop and told me that only a short time before
he had discovered a beautiful egg of Alca impennis in
the Derby Collection which he, though he had been
Curator of it for more than ten years, had never before
seen. In or about the very same year two were found
by Dr. Lepierre in the Museum at Lausanne, where they
had lain, since 1846 at least, unsuspected ; and in 1861
I myself found in the Museum of the Royal College of
Surgeons no fewer than ten, which must have been
there for fifty years or more without their existence having
been recognised. There is therefore nothing at all
extraordinary in the supposition that one might have
been overlooked in the Museum of the United Service
Institution, and it was only the facts that the alleged
donor's name was affixed to it, and that he many months
after denied having ever made such a gift, which proved
the story to be untrue, while subsequently the disappear-
ance of Mr. Salmon's specimen from his cabinet indicated
the source whence the present specimen was derived.

Rather more than a year later Newton made the
greatest discovery of Great Auks' eggs that ever fell to
the lot of a naturalist.

Only fancy a discovery I made the other day ; it
quite took away my breath ! Going to Surgeons' Hall

46 THE GREAT AUK

to inspect Owen's dissection of a Great Bustard, I found
Huxley there, who asked me what I wanted. He told
me I should most likely find it in such and such a place.
Ascending to the topmost gallery of the innermost room,
a glass case with birds' eggs met my eye. After looking
at one or two grimy Ostrich's and deformed Turkey's
which might have belonged to John Hunter, I saw, as I
thought, a nice model of a Great Auk, next to it was a
prickly hen's, and then, on, on, on, as far as the eye could
reach, Great Auk's ! ! To cut it short, there were ten,
nearly all in excellent preservation, though one or two
are a little broken. Of course, I hardly obtained credence
from my friends ; but next day I took Tristram and
Sclater and Simpson, and we all four had the case opened
and handled the eggs which are neatly sealing- waxed on
to boards.

As soon as my first emotions by the way were over I
called out over the railing to Huxley and told him what
I had discovered ; whereupon to the astonishment of
some grave-looking medical students in spectacles, he
answered back that I was like Saul who went out to seek
his father's asses and found a Kingdom ; to which I could
only respond that I hoped I should, like my illustrious
prototype, succeed in gaining possession of my discovery.
How they came there I don't know, but expect to make
out ; no doubt they are Iceland. I always was sure of
more being in England than I could trace.*

Not one of those ten eggs did find its way into
Newton's hands, but his collection, now belonging to the
University of Cambridge, ultimately contained seven
eggs of the Great Auk, the largest number in any collec-
tion. Two had belonged to John Wolley, one was the
specimen obtained from Mr. Calvert, and four were
presented to Newton by Lord Lilford in 1888. These
latter four eggs had been sold in Edinburgh only eight
years previously for the ridiculously small price of

* Letter to Edward Newton, Christmas Day, 1861.

HISTORY OF GREAT AUKS' EGGS 47

thirty-two shillings. The history and antecedents of all
the specimens were minutely investigated, and a mass
of correspondence, which he preserved, with people in
many countries testifies to Newton's untiring industry in
this respect. Many of his correspondents were inaccu-
rate, and some even drew on their imagination to give
him information which they thought might appear to be
true, but he was expert in sifting the grain from the
chaff, and never recorded any fact of the accuracy of
which he had the smallest doubt.

It is very curious how men readily accept as evidence
of history, what is not evidence at all. Not many days
since I had a remarkable instance of this. I wanted to
find out what had become of the Gare-fowl's egg that
Wilmot had in his collection, and at his death left to a
friend of his, Mr. George L. Russell, himself now dead.
I made inquiries through a friend, and in time got a
letter telling me all I wanted to know and a great deal
that I did not know ; e.g. that the egg was taken by
Wolley on an island near Archangel (! !). Fortunately
for the cause of historical accuracy I have Wilmot's own
testimony that he bought his specimen for £5 in 1846,
of Leadbeater, and there can be little doubt of its being
one of those that were got on Eldey.*

The history of Mr. Yarrell's egg, which went to Mr. F.
Bond and subsequently into the collection of Baron
D'Hamonville, was investigated by Mr. Harting. Yarrell
had bought the egg as a Duck's egg from a fisherwoman
at Boulogne or Paris, and her story was that she had
received it from her husband, who had been a seaman on
board a whaler, implying that it might have been
brought from the Arctic regions This Newton considered
most improbable.

* Letter to Col. H. W. Feilden, December 1, 1884.

48 THE GREAT AUK

Magdalene College, Cambridge,
March 17, 1894.

MY DEAR HARTING,

My letter to D'Hamonville, which he quoted in
the Bulletin, was written to correct the statement he
had made in the Memoires of the French Zool.
Soc., 1888 (p. 225), and the point of it was to show that
Yarrell had bought his egg of Alca impennis in France,
but whether at Boulogne or in Paris did not, for the
purpose I had in view, signify — so I merely expressed
my belief without turning up the evidence. It was only
the other day when the " whaler " made a public appear-
ance that the place where it was bought became a con-
sideration of any importance. Then I looked into the
matter with the result that you know. I have not much
doubt that old Bond, to the end of his days, honestly
believed that the Great Auk inhabited the ' Arctic
Regions " ; but then he never cared to inform himself
very accurately on points of this kind, and would not
recognise the improbability (I might say the impossibility)
of a " whaler " bringing home one of its eggs — or even
a dozen of them.

If I were to correct or refute all the incorrect stories
about this bird, which are published from time to time,
I should have enough to do. Even when they concern
myself I am generally content to leave them alone, just
as I left alone an astounding statement in the Field
of December 17, 1887, about my discovery of the ten
eggs in the College of Surgeons Museum, or one in the
Standard of February 23, 1894, about the destruction of
Scales's egg, which (except the fact that it was burnt)
is an entire fabrication !

It is only on a point like this which one has been
driving into people for more than 30 years that I feel
called upon to interfere ; but I see that the attempt is
useless ; though it does vex me, I confess, when those
who ought to know, and really do know, better incon-
siderately help to maintain the popular delusion. This
delusion was for a long while (and possibly is now) shared
by Mr. Champley of Scarborough, as I know that at one

GARE-FOWL BOOK 49

time he was busy in inquiring of Arctic navigators and
others who had been in the far north after Alca impennis,
although the absurdity of such inquiry had been demon-
strated for several years.

I wish there were the slightest chance of my being
able to finish a Great Auk book before I die — but it is
impossible. Nevertheless, I go on collecting all the
materials I can, and somebody who comes after me may
make use of them. I think that two-thirds of such a
book would be taken up by refuting errors !

Yours very truly,

ALFRED NEWTON.

It was his purpose to write a book, to be called " The
Story of the Gare-fowl," and after the publication of the
* Ootheca Wolleyana ' he hoped that he might have
time to put it into order, but his life was not long enough
for that. He had collected during the course of fifty
years notes on every known specimen of the bird and of
its eggs, and it may be hoped that some day this labour
will be completed.

Every question connected with the bird was of
absorbing interest to him, not the least being that of the
origin of its Sightlessness. He was never fully satisfied
that the wings of the Great Auk were the degenerate
remains of wings, which in remote ancestors had been
useful for flight.

I can't satisfy myself as to the way in which the Gare-
fowl's Sightlessness was produced, and I suppose I never
shall. I can only conjecture that he found wings fit for
flight articles too expensive for him to indulge in. If he
descended from a Razor-bill it is not difficult to imagine
that he found big wings were not worth the trouble of
growing and it was better to expend energy in simply
accumulating bulk. But one has no more right to
assume that he descended from a Razor-bill than that
the Razor-bill descended from him. The most reasonable

E

50 THE GREAT AUK

conjecture seems to be that they had a common
ancestor who differed in some degree from both, but still
one would think that common ancestor must have had
the power of flight. Such natural enemies as that
common ancestor (or the Razor-bill for the matter of
that) possessed may be roughly divided into 2 categories :
enemies in the air or on land, and enemies in the water.
Now in the water, wings to an Alcine bird are chiefly
useful for steering (the propelling power being in the
legs) and a very little bit of wing would do to steer with,
and escape from a grampus or seal (?). In the air a wing
must be very good to be good for anything, if not it is
better not to fly at all (witness Wollaston's Madeiran
Coleopterd). Natural selection would soon weed out
animals with moderate wings and leave those that had
the best or the worst. OD land I take it the Gare-fowl
had practically no enemies till man came to civilise him.
I don't say these views satisfy me, there may be
considerations I have altogether overlooked, but I think
they may serve as indications of something like the way
it was done.*

During the last years of his life he spent a few weeks
of almost every summer on board the yacht of his
friend, Henry Evans, of Derby. Most of their cruises
were in Scottish waters, and it was the keenest delight to
him to visit the former breeding-places of the Great Auk.

May 13, 1898.

I am off on June 17th for another cruise in Henry
Evans' yacht. I want to stop at the Holm of Papa
Westray and see the slope on which the King and Queen
of the Auks used to hold their court.f

And a few weeks later —

We had a most glorious day on the Holm of Papa

* Letter to Col. H. W. Feilden, July 27, 1885.

f The last Orcadian Great Auk was killed in 1812, and is now in the
British Museum.

VISIT TO ORKNEY 51

Westray, and I wished the whole time you had been
there. The sloping slabs would admit of a whole
regiment of Great Auks landing and marching up in
extended line to a place where eggs could be laid in safety,
and this at any stage of the tide or almost any conceivable
weather — for the place is beautifully sheltered by the
covering coast of Papa Westray.*

When, later, his increasing infirmity prevented him
from venturiDg into the confined space of a small yacht,
he often suggested to others that they should explore
coasts and islands with a view to rinding what might
appear to have been possible haunts of the extinct bird.
In the spring of 1907 Major Barrett-Hamilton f wished

to visit the islands, as being a possible origin of the

Great Auk remains found in Ireland, and as a matter of
course he applied to Professor Newton for advice.

I am very glad you have seen and arranged with
Ussher for a trip to those islets, also that for you it will
not be so difficult a business. Now as to ' minute
instructions " for which you ask, beyond desiring you to
run into no danger — and that is a positive order, not to
be neglected on any account — I don't know what there
is to be said.

The question to ascertain is whether these rocks may
have been (as Ussher suggests) a sufficient resort for the
Gare-fowl, at any time of the year, but breeding season
(the middle of May) especially, to make it worth while
of the old kitchen midden people to have visited them and
got thence the plunder of which Ussher has found the
remains. Otherwise it is difficult to understand where
their birds could have been got. From what we know
elsewhere, Gare-fowls are stupid and easily taken on land,
but hard to approach at sea, and granting that the men
had bows and arrows, they would not get them very easily.

* Letter to J. A, Harvie-Brown, July 1, 1898.

t G. E. H. Barrett-Hamilton, M.A., of Trin. ColL, Camb., author of
" British Mammals." Died, South Georgia, 1914.

52 THE GREAT AUK

Then there is also this consideration ; do these rocks
afford a place for a flightless bird to run up a slope, or
even scramble over a not too high ascent to a place where
she might lay her egg out of the reach of the waves ? On.
Eldey the available space must have been small, and not
over big on the sunken Gare-fowl skerry, though I have
no means of computing what the area was in either case.
On Holm of Papa Westray, supposing that I was right
in determining the place, there was room for scores, not
to say hundreds, and on Funk Island for millions.

If your Irish locality could accommodate a score it
would have been quite a creditable place, but I should
think that unless it lodged as many the people would
hardly have found it worth visiting for plunder. About
all these matters you must use your own intelligence.
You know how Razorbills and their like behave, and you
must make allowance for a bigger sort bereft of flight.*

The extinct and disappearing faunas, especially of
oceanic islands, had a peculiar attraction for him, and
among other birds in which he took the greatest interest
was the Dodo. By the fortunate circumstance of his
brother Edward, himself an accomplished ornithologist,
having been appointed Assistant Colonial Secretary of
Mauritius in 1859, he had exceptional opportunities of
acquiring specimens of the Dodo of Mauritius and the
Solitaire of Rodriguez. In 1865 the British Association
appointed him with Mr. Tristram and Dr. P. L. Sclater
to be a Committee for the purpose of assisting Mr.
E. Newton in his researches for the extinct Didine birds
of the Mascareen Islands, and to report thereon at the
next meeting of the Association ; and that the sum of
£50 be placed at their disposal for the purpose." The
results of these inquiries were published in several
papers in the Reports of the British Association and
Proceedings of the Zoological and Royal Societies. His

* Letter to G. E. H. Barrett-Hamilton, May 18, 1907.

THE DODO 53

article on the Dodo in the " Dictionary of Birds " may be
cited as an illustration of the learning and the exhaus-
tive criticism with which he could discuss a matter
that strongly appealed to him.

During the next fifteen years Newton secured
specimens of the remains of most of the extinct birds of
the islands, including an almost complete skeleton of the
Dodo, which is one of the most valued possessions of the
Cambridge University Museum.

Many years later, when his friend Mr. Meade- Waldo
was joining Lord Crawford on a cruise in the yacht
Valhalla, Newton urged him to remember the Dodo and
the other extinct birds of the Indian Ocean islands.

. . . There is not a single living thing in any one of
the islands you are to visit that is not of the highest
importance — of that you may be sure — and unfortunately
few if any of the people who have been there before have
understood what opportunities they had, and therefore
have failed to appreciate them. From what you write
I should think it very likely that on your way back you
will call at Mauritius. In that case you might be doing
a great service if you could prevail on the authorities of
the Museum there to entrust to you the collection of
Dodo's and other mostly extinct birds' bones which they
lately bought of a M. Thirion, an enthusiastic barber,
living in Port Louis, who has been for some years past
digging them up for his own satisfaction — he having had
the luck to find a place (I have never known clearly
whether a cave or not) which has been very prolific. He
made a great secret of the place and I don't blame him
for that, but he sold all his " find " to the Museum, and
there it is with no one, so far as I know, competent to
describe it. Among the specimens are portions of the
Dodo's skeleton, which were hitherto unknown, and it
is most desirable that they should be described and
figured properly — to say nothing of the remains of other
extinct species, Lophopsittacus, Aphanapteryx, etc., of

54 THE GREAT AUK

which we have but fragments. ... It would be a great
thing if you could persuade the people there to let you
bring them home to have them done — and certainly
there is no other place where they could be done properly
except Cambridge, because we have here by far the most
complete skeleton of the Dodo, and almost without
exception all the remains of the other birds, which were
described by my late brother Edward and Gadow in the
Transactions of the Zoological Society, and it would
be a pity if these were described anywhere else.*

When his brother Edward was transferred to the
post of Lieutenant- Governor of Jamaica, Newton was
enabled to make a valuable collection of the birds of that
and other West Indian islands. It was mainly due to
Newton also that the ' ' Sandwich Islands Committee '
of the British Association was formed and the fast
vanishing fauna of that region studied.

As an East Anglian Newton was naturally greatly
interested in another extinct (so far as Britain is con-
cerned) bird, the Great Bustard, or as he liked to call it,
the Norfolk Bustard, which had vanished from this
country during his own lifetime. Though there were
still a few birds lingering in Norfolk in the " thirties,"
particularly in the neighbourhood of his father's estate
of Elveden, it is doubtful if Newton • ever saw a native
Bustard alive. He made an attempt to see a bird
between Cambridge and Ely in 1856, but was too late.

Last week I was at Cambridge, and there heard a
report that a Bustard had been seen in the neighbour-
hood. I accordingly went to Burwell Fen, in company
with my brother and a gentleman interested in Orni-
thology, and on searching a field of coleseed we found
several feathers which were most undoubtedly those of
the Great Bustard. The gentleman who accompanied
us had been there a few days before and had not only

* Letter to E. G. B. Meade-Waldo, October 29, 1905.

NORFOLK BUSTARD 55

then found more feathers but had seen a good many
foot-prints which could only have been those of that bird.

I saw several men at work in the fen, and gathered
from them that they had several times seen a ' ; Wild
Turkey ' (as they called it) : according to one man's
account, it had been there from shortly after Christmas
until the last few days, but another man who said he
thought he had seen it before any one else, was of opinion
that the time it had haunted the fen was not more than
three weeks. However, in the main points they all
agreed, and leave one to entertain no doubt but that for
some weeks a Great Bustard had frequented that locality.
They were very accurate in their description of the bird ;
one man compared the markings on the back and wings
to a viper, saying that " it was dappled like a snake " ;
another said it "made a wonderful roarin' with its wings"
when it flew over.

I was there on Thursday, the 6th inst., and on the
preceding Saturday it had been shot at by a gunner,
but only with a common hand-gun, and as the bird was
more than 100 yards off, it doubtless escaped unhurt.
I was unable to make out satisfactorily whether it had
been seen since that day, but I am inclined to think that
it took the gunner's hint and departed. Since then I
have heard nothing new, though my brother who has
been at Cambridge until within the last day or two, has
made unceasing inquiries. I therefore sincerely hope
that it has altogether escaped and that it will not in
consequence help to fill the blood-stained pages of the
Natural History Magazines.*

Twenty years later, in the company of Mr. J. E.
Harting and others, he had the good fortune to see a
Bustard alive in England. Mr. Harting writes : —

A brief mention should be made of the pleasure we
both experienced in seeing a real wild Bustard in a
Norfolk fen. In Feb. 1876, Mr. H. M. Upcher, of

* Letter to T. Southwell, March 14, 1856.

56 THE GREAT AUK

Sheringham, unexpectedly found one (a male bird) on
his property in Blackdyke Fen, Hockwold, and by means
of letters to neighbouring landowners, and the dis-
semination of printed notices, made strenuous efforts to
prevent its being shot. Steps to provide it with a mate
were taken by the late Lord Lilford. In company with
Mr. Upcher and a few privileged friends we had the
satisfaction of watching the movements of the illustrious
visitor and seeing the hen bird turned out in the same
field of coleseed with it ; but the weather being very
inclement at the time, the hen bird was accidentally
drowned in a fen dyke, and the male after a stay of seven
weeks disappeared.

During more than fifty years, up to the time of his
death, Newton collected details of the history of the
Great Bustard, more especially with reference to its
extinction. He amassed an immense amount of in-
formation which was to take form, some day, in a book
to be called " The Bustard in Britain," but he was never
satisfied with the completeness of his material, and the
book still awaits an editor.

Attempts have been made, from time to time, to
reintroduce the Great Bustard into Great Britain, but
none of them have been successful. Amongst those who
made the experiment was Prince Dhuleep Singh, the
owner of Elveden Hall.

Bloxworth, August 31, 1874.

MY DEAR LILFORD,

I have little doubt that if you were the owner
of Elden you would be successful in introducing the
Bustard, while I don't believe that Dhuleep Singh ever
will be.

As regards the migration of Bustards formerly in
England I have always been in doubt. Neither in
Norfolk nor Suffolk did they ever seem to have appeared
in their usual abundance in the shooting season. I
think I stated this in the notes with which I furnished

THE BUSTARD 57

Stevenson, but I have not got his 2nd volume with me
here. Indeed, to the best of my recollection, I could
never hear of but one well-established instance of a
Bustard being seen between harvest time and the begin-
ning of the New Year. This was a young bird shot by
the late Sir Alexander Grant (an old friend of my father's)
at Elden in September.

What became of the birds in the meantime I have no
idea, but early in January, quite regardless of snow or
frost, they used to be seen on the brecks and so remained
till the corn (rye) hid them in the summer.

The question of polygamy is also a dark point in
their history.

As to the southern distribution of the species, I never
saw an African specimen, and I have sometimes been
inclined to doubt whether the big Bustard of Algeria,
etc., might not be Otis arabs, which you know poor Drake
got in Morocco (Ibis, 1867, p. 424).

Yours in haste,

ALFRED NEWTON.

When Mr. Harting was preparing his edition of
: White's Selborne " (published in 1875). he included in
it Gilbert White's allusions to the Bustard, hitherto un-
published, and sent the proofs to Newton for his
comments.

Bloxworth, Blandford,

August 22, 1874.

MY DEAR HARTING,

You will see by the ' proof ' which I now
return of the notes for your edition of ": White's Selborne"
that I have read it pretty attentively, and have not
hesitated to suggest several changes in it of more or less
importance.

Those of the greatest consequence are such as relate
to Black Game and Bustard.

It has always puzzled me to account for White's
having said that the former had become extinct since
his boyhood. The species has existed I imagine always

58 THE GREAT AUK

in the wild heathery tract which extends, with even now
but few interruptions, from beyond the parish in which
I write to Surrey — the tract which you will see laid down
on any geological map as the " Bagshot Sand." Sup-
posing that the species did for a time become extinct in
any one portion of this district it would speedily find its
way to its old haunts, so well suited to it, from the
remainder.

You may certainly have some authority for saying
that it was " introduced " to Wolmer Forest — but with-
out direct evidence to that effect I should rather attribute
its reappearance (supposing White to be right in saying
that it had disappeared) to natural causes. But even
when White wrote Letter VI. — which I think we may
put at or near 1789, the date of publication — (for I
imagine that the first few letters were an after-thought,
and expressly written by way of introduction to the
published work, while the later ones were no doubt real
letters) — a Grey Hen had been seen two years before only
—and then there is the celebrated " Hybrid Pheasant '
sent to him by Lord Stawell from Alice Holt, subsequently
to 1789, whose existence required that of a Black Grouse
of one sex or the other. Thus I am inclined to doubt
White's statement as to its extinction in 1789.

As regards Bustards — the birds which from time to
time appear in England are unquestionably of foreign
extraction. Nothing in the world can be clearer than
the extinction of the British race. Norfolk was their
last stronghold, but in the south of England they were
gone long before.

These remarks are simply to explain the alterations
I have suggested on your " proof."

I believe there is no good authority for the use of the
word " nest " as a verb, and hence I have altered it.

In any natural history work I should always recom-
mend the printing of the English names of species with a
capital letter. They are in such cases to all intents and
purposes proper names, and should be so distinguished,
but I have not marked them on the " proof " for altera-

ACCLIMATISATION AND EXTERMINATION 59

tion. Printers to save themselves trouble decry the use
of capitals, but within limits it is very desirable.

Yrs. very truly,

ALFRED NEWTON.

Although the re-introduction of the Capercaillie into
Scotland had been so successful, Newton never quite
approved of these experiments, which he regarded rather
as attempts at acclimatisation, and of that he wrote : —

Everything relating to what is called Acclimatisation
is hateful to me, but I do think it is just possible that if
Strix uralensis were introduced into this country, it
might be of some use to check the Eat plague, and as
Rats themselves are interlopers it might be fair to use
aliens against them.

In the light of the Little Owl plague at the present
time, it is fortunate that that experiment also failed.

All questions of the extinction of animals concerned
him very closely (vide the article "Extermination" in
the " Dictionary of Birds "), and in an address delivered
to the British Association at Glasgow in 1876, he described
in his own peculiar way the consequences of unconsidered
acclimatisation.

What if a future " Challenger " shall report of some
island, now known to possess a rich and varied animal
population, that its present fauna has disappeared ?
That its only Mammals were feral Pigs, Goats, Eats and
Eabbits — with an infusion of Ferrets, introduced by a
zealous ' ' acclimatiser ' to check the super-abundance
of the rodents last named, but contenting themselves
with the colonists' chickens ? That Sparrows and
Starlings, brought from Europe, were its only Land-
birds, that the former had propagated to such an extent
that the cultivation of cereals had ceased to pay — the
prohibition of bird-keeping boys by the local school
board contributing to the same effect — and that the latter

60 THE GKEAT AUK

(the Starlings) having put an end to the indigenous
insectivorous birds by consuming their food, had turned
their attentions to the settlers' orchards, so that a crop
of fruit was only to be looked for about once in five
years — when the great periodical cyclones had reduced
the number of the depredators ? that the Goats had
destroyed one half of the original flora and the Rabbits
the rest ? that the Pigs devastated the potato gardens
and yam-grounds ? This is no fanciful picture. I
pretend not to the gift of prophecy ; that is a faculty
alien to the scientific mind ; but if we may reason from
the known to the unknown, from what has been and
from what is to what will be, I cannot entertain a doubt
that these things are coming to pass ; for I am sure there
are places where what is very like them has already
happened.

None of those who were present are likely to forget
the occasion, one evening in Newton's rooms, when a
young man interrupted an interesting talk about the
fate of (it may have been) Moas with the rather large
question : ; Why do birds become extinct ? ' The
Professor replied without hesitation, ' Because people
don't observe the Game Laws ; see Deuteronomy xxii.
6." The conversation languished after that and we soon
returned to our various colleges, where we looked up his
reference and read —

If a bird's nest chance to be before thee in the way
in any tree, or on the ground, whether they be young
ones, or eggs, and the dam sitting upon the young, or
upon the eggs, thou shalt not take the dam with the
young.

But thou shalt in any wise let the dam go, and take
the young to thee ; that it may be well with thee, and that
thou mayest prolong thy days.

CHAPTER V

THE IBIS

FOR some years it had been the custom for a number of
naturalists, most of them members of the University of
Cambridge, and all of them interested in the study of
Ornithology, to meet together once a year or oftener, for
the discussion of various topics and the exhibition of
objects of interest. These " conferences," as they were
called, were highly appreciated by those who attended
them, and in the autumn of 1857 at the meeting which
was held (as usual) in Newton's rooms at Cambridge, it
was suggested that it would be advisable to establish a
magazine devoted solely to Ornithology. In the following
year a number of ornithologists met at the British
Association meeting at Leeds, when they decided to meet
again at Cambridge in November and discuss the question
of the magazine. Accordingly a meeting was held in
Newton's rooms at Magdalene on November 17, 1858,
when the following resolutions were adopted :

1. That an Ornithologists' Union of twenty Members

should be formed, with the principal object of
establishing a new Journal entirely devoted to
Birds.

2. That Lt.-Col. H. M. Drummond should be the

President and A. Newton the Secretary of the
Union, and that P. L. Sclater should edit the
Journal.

No official record of the meeting was made, but it
seems to be fairly certain that eleven people were present.

61

62 THE IBIS

As an instance of my f orgetfulness I could have taken
oath that Gurney was present at the Conference at
Cambridge in October, 1858, when we founded the
Ibis — or Avis as was to have been its name. Now I find
from looking at old letters that Gurney was not at the
Conference of 1858, though he had intended to be there,
but had to go to a funeral somewhere else. He had
been, however, at a former Conference, that of 1857 I
suppose. Those present in 1858 so far as I can make out
were yourself, Drummond, P. L. Sclater, and E. C.
Taylor whom he brought down, the Godmans, Salvin,
Sealy, Simpson, and A. and E. N. — eleven in all. I
think any letters of that period are worth keeping, for
no doubt the institution of the Ibis had a very remark-
able effect on Ornithology all the world over. Alas that
the poor old bird should nowadays fly so feebly, and yet
I quite believe that its youth might be renewed, if proper
steps were taken.*

Newton was very definite in declaring that not all
of these were the founders of the Union.

Don't forget that E. N. [Edward Newton] was
emphatically one of the founders of the B.O.U., which
is a good deal more than being only one of the original 20.
I have always looked on the founders as : —

Drummond.

Tristram.

Newtons (2).

Salvin.

Godmans (2).

The rest — Sclater, Gurney, and Wolley included —
were asked to join us.

The Editor and the Secretary lost no time in making
arrangements for the new magazine, and Messrs. Taylor
and Francis agreed to print it. The head of the latter
firm, Dr. William Francis, suggested the name Ibis,

* Letter to H. B. Tristram, January 2, 1888.

H'. J' J>. DoirneiJ.
SIR EDWARD NEWTOX, K.C.M.G.

FOUNDATION OF B.O.U. 63

and Joseph Wolf,* a friend of Newton, was commissioned
to draw the figure of the Sacred Bird, which has always
adorned the cover of the journal.

I owe you many apologies for not having written to
you before, but I have been so very, very busy.

I hope things are promising for the Ibis ; we nearly
lost Wolley f through the change of name, but I trust
he is appeased. His name is such a tower of strength
that we could not set up to be Ornithologists of the first
water without his co-operation. As for the name itself, I
don't think it signifies £0-0-2, and " Ibis " is as good as
any other ; does it not signify c: You will go," i.e. to the
ends of the world, and in fact the Ibis is one of the most
cosmopolitan of genera. I regard it in this light, and
not in the way Wolley does, as a thing with a long bill,
apt to be shut up in cellars for thousands of years, with
no life about it at all. I look upon it too as the scourge
of reptiles ; the harbinger of that source of wealth and
abundance, the overflowing of the river of knowledge ;
and therefore I recommend Ibidiculture to all my friends,
reminding them at the same time to say nothing against
the sacred bird, for fear of the laws of the land of Egypt
being put in force in this country : vide, Herodotus,
Euterpe, chap. 65.J

The first number of the Ibis, which was ready in
January, 1859, contained an article by Newton and his
brother Edward on the birds of St. Croix, West Indies,
the results of their visit to the island in 1857. As the
editor, P. L. Sclater, was away during the early part of
that year, and was shortly afterwards appointed to the
arduous post of Secretary to the Zoological Society,
Newton busied himself with the work of getting con-
tributors to write articles for the new Journal. The

* " My friend Mr. Wolf, whose supreme excellence as a zoological artist
was only equalled by his readiness to oblige any one who appreciated good
work." — " Ootheca Wolleyana," Introduction, p. vi.

t J. W. wanted the magazine to be called " Avis."

\ Letter to H. B. Tristram, December 10, 1858.

64 THE IBIS

first number was received with a chorus of praise by
contemporary journals, so Newton tried to induce others
to write less favourable comments, lest the young society
should become too much filled with satisfaction. Mr.
A. C. Smith, who was not yet a member, was asked by
Newton to write a letter to the Zoologist picking holes in,
or pulling feathers out of, the Ibis, and in reply to his
complaint that he had no fault to find with the magazine
he received the following letter : — •

But your objection that you do not know what to
find fault with in the Ibis is indeed not valid. Nothing
can be easier. It is printed 8vo size ; it ought to have
been 4to to have allowed the plates to be larger, or 12mo,
that it would have been easier to hold in the hand. It
ought to be published monthly or bi-monthly, or half-
yearly, or annually ; anything but quarterly. There is
a want of unity about the design, or its contents display
page after page a sameness which palls upon the reader.
Its price is too high for the ornithological public, or it is
too low to enable justice to be done to the plates. No
publication of the sort was wanted at all, or that the
void which every one felt existed has by no means been
filled by the Ibis. Or, to go into particulars, that the
Ornithology of Central America is far too dry, the birds
of St. Croix too flippant. Mr. E. C. Taylor's paper on
Egyptian Ornithology is only a rechauffe of what had
already appeared in the Zoologist. (N.B. — Taylor says
he sent his list of birds to Newman with remarks upon
them, as afterwards printed in the Ibis, but Newman cut
them all out, except one about the Egyptian Vulture's
feet, and printed the bare list in the Zoologist.) Mr.
Wolley devotes whole articles to the finding of a bird's
nest as if no one had ever done such a thing before. Mr.
Simpson is as bad. Messrs. Sturge and Evans thought
because they went so far as Spitzbergen, therefore it was
necessary that everybody else should be interested about
them. Mr. Gurney's contributions are mere lists of what
his collectors send him. Messrs. Salvin and Tristram

THE IBIS 65

vary so in their accounts of the same things that one
knows not which to believe ; or that they both agree so
exactly that it must be the result of a previous determina-
tion to do so, and hence their testimony is valueless. The
remarks on the Harlequin Duck are full of misprints,
and that the author's notions of geography are exceed-
ingly singular, when he speaks of ' Europe with the
exception of Iceland and Western Asia." That Mr.
Hewitson's contribution has spoiled a good supplement
to his work. That the Editorial articles are merely a
display of knowledge, and that the review of Bree's
book is ill-natured in the extreme, or that it does not
detect half the faults in that very inaccurate publication.
That the subject of British Ornithology is entirely passed
over by the Ibis, or that British Ornithology should be
left entirely to other magazines. That the scientific
principles enunciated are merely the old ones always
known, or they have a most startling and unpleasant
novelty ; or that there are no scientific principles at all.
That there is a horrible taint of heresy about the whole
matter, or that the writers are far too orthodox for
zoologists in these days.

Here is a string of objections, any one of which may
be harped upon, or all at once according to the fancy of
the player ; for a reviewer may be allowed to bring contra-
dictory charges, as in certain actions contradictory pleas
are used, first " not guilty " and then " justification." *

A question which greatly exercised the minds of the
founders of the Ibis was that of a suitable motto for the
Journal. Sclater sought eagerly for one in the classics,
but not finding one that was appropriate he composed a
line :-

Ibimus incolumes tutique sub " ibide " sacra.

Newton writes : " I have suggested to him as being
better : —

' I semel in terras, ibis sub nomine et Ibis
Sed quacunque ibis, floreat " Ibis " ibi.' '

* Letter to A. C. Smith, July 18, 1859.

66 THE IBIS

Finally, it was decided that the motto for the first
series of the Ibis should be :—

Ibimus indomiti venerantes Ibida sacram,
Ibimus incolumes qua prior Ibis adest.

This did not meet altogether with Newton's approval.

The Ibis motto as it now is I confess I do not under-
stand, but it is not worth while bothering about, and I
have never intimated my disapproval to Sclater. I think
I told you that Knox showed mine to the Bishop of
Oxford (Stubbs), and he very much approved of it,
though no doubt there was a solecism in the grammar.

Though he was not at any time a very frequent con-
tributor of articles to the magazine, Newton did much
work in reviewing books and in other ways greatly
assisted Sclater, whom he succeeded as editor of the
second series of the Ibis (1865 to 1870). He was very
keen on starting discussions, so in 1865 he got G. D.
Rowley to write an article about the Cuckoo, or, as he
always spelt it, Cuckow, and then asked A. C. Smith to
write a letter of disagreement, thinking that ' it will
make people take a greater interest in the journal in
which it appears." He did not want articles to be
' scientific catalogues, but rather readable, written in a
simply unaffected way." To a correspondent who com-
plained that the Ibis went out of his depth he replied that
he doubted it, " but if it does you must learn to swim —
and the process is easy when you have made up your
mind to it, for our Holy Fowl is a typical wader and its
legs are not so very long after all."

His period of editorship was a time of strenuous work
and of rapidly increasing responsibilities, so that he was
unable to undertake the third series, which was edited
by Osbert Salvin. Many years after wards, writing to an
old friend who lay dying, he recalled the early struggles
of the Ibis.

CANON TRISTRAM 67

February 26, 1906.

MY DEAR TRISTRAM,

If the letter I have just received is really to be
the last I am to have from you, as therein foreshadowed,
there could not be one more gratifying to my feelings,
and I am at a loss for terms in which to answer it. I
can never forget the steady, friendly, I may say, brotherly
support I have invariably received from you, and if it
were my good fortune to have done you a good turn in
the matter of the Royal Society, a circumstance that
had wholly passed from my mind, it was but a slight
return for the aid you rendered in starting the B.O.U.
and the Ibis, and again at the critical moment when our
first Editor threw up the job, and (with one or two more)
would not have been sorry had it come to an end. It
was your Palestine papers that to a very great extent
caused the success of the second series of the Ibis ; not
that I would overlook the value of the help I had from
Blyth, Swinhoe, and others. Their articles were of great
scientific interest, but they failed in the qualities for
reading, while your articles possessed both merits.

There are few things I look back to with greater
satisfaction than my six years' editorship of the Ibis,
but that was entirely due to my contributors, among
whom you were chief, and one on whom I could always
rely.

I can't trust myself to write more, and indeed you
might easily be tired with more. It must indeed have
been a comfort to you to have had all your children
round you on Saturday, and so I say farewell, and God
be with you till you are with Him.

Yours as always,

ALFRED NEWTON.

*

Henry Baker Tristram, Canon of Durham, was a
friend and frequent correspondent of Newton's for several
years before the foundation of the B.O.U., of which he
was an original member. That Newton had a very
strong affection for him is shown by his action " in the

68 THE IBIS

matter of the Royal Society," which is explained by the
following letter, written ten days before his death.

The College, Durham,

February 25, 1906.

MY DEAR NEWTON,

It is utterly impossible to get out of your debt
epistolary, as I have found ever since that unparalleled
act of friendship many years ago, when you took off your
name from the Royal Society in order to secure my
election. When one looks back through the long vista of
years there is nothing I have found to equal it for self-
sacrifice and generosity. But, that apart, there is only
one sense of generous fraternity. I am glad to deliver
my soul.

In my present state of health the political outlook
hardly interests me, for I am very ill. The doctor stays
in the house with me generally all night, as I suffer from
breathlessness, but I have had the comfort of having my
family, eight children and my sons-in-law gathered round
me yesterday.

Before my attack became worse I was able to enjoy
two papers in the Ibis on Ross' Rosy Gull and the
Scotch Antarctic, as well as to glance at my old friend
Mr. Whitaker's Tunisia, which resuscitated many
interests of bygone years. I dare say this may be my last
letter.

Your sincere old friend,

H. B. TRISTRAM.

Tristram was distinguished as a traveller, a naturalist,
and an antiquary. He devoted himself particularly to
the ornithology of Northern Africa, about which he wrote
several most interesting papers in the early numbers of
the Ibis, and of Palestine, which he visited several times
and described in published volumes. In those countries
he made many ornithological discoveries, and his sudden
and unexpected departures were a constant source of
mystification to his friends, among whom he was known

INTEREST IN IBIS 69

as the " Sacred Ibis " or the " Great Gun of Durham."
He was during all his life an indefatigable collector, and
his birds and eggs, almost the largest collection ever
amassed by one man, are now in the Liverpool and
South Kensington Museums.

I saw a long letter from Tristram to Sclater from
Jerusalem, in which he says they have done wonders.
If all he advances is true they must have got some twenty
new species of birds.* Among other things he has found
the descendants of the Ravens that fed Elijah, and they
are previously undescribed except by the author of the
Book of Kings. In future they are to stand as Corvus
Elice, Tristram. I have only to hope that Asinus
balaami and Cetus jonce will also be found.f

After the end of his term of office as editor of the
Ibis Newton no longer took an active part in managing
the affairs of the B.O.U., but his interest in the Society
never failed, though he disapproved of certain modern
innovations, and his advice was constantly sought by
successive editors of the Journal. There were times
when it appeared that the editors had not very carefully
read the articles they published, and these occasional
lapses seldom escaped him : — •

The Ibis for the past year has certainly been dis-
tinguished by some crackers. It was only yesterday I
heard from Legge, who drew my attention to a curious
statement at p. 143 : —

" On the top of trees in Celebes," says Meyer, " builds the Whimbrel."
Then De Meyer is a 1 — r : proclaim it with a timbrel !

It was unfortunate that he would never be persuaded
to approve of the British Ornithologists' Club, which was

* One of the birds discovered on that journey was Tristram's Grakle
(Amydrus tristrami), which he found in the rocky gorges of the Dead Sea.
t Letter to Edward Xewton, March 25, 1864.

70 THE IBIS

founded in the late " nineties." He was accustomed to
call by a most uncomplimentary name those monthly
meetings and dinners which have done so much to
advance the study of ornithology and to promote good
fellowship among its votaries.

One of the original " Ibises " and the first of them to
die, in November, 1859, at the early age of thirty-six
years, was Newton's friend, John Wolley. Shortly before
his death he requested that his zoological collection, the
formation of which had latterly been his chief occupation,
should be handed over to Newton, and this wish was
fully carried out by his father. The collectons were sent,
in February, 1860, from Beeston to Newton's home at
Elveden.

There were twenty-four enormous packages, which
weighed altogether one ton and filled a railway truck
—not a single breakage ! After consulting on the
subject with P. L. Sclater, I came to the conclusion that
I should be most advantageously serving the interest of
Ornithology by publishing from Mr. Wolley's note-books
a complete catalogue of the contents of his egg-cabinet.
Mr. Wolley's life had been one of so active a nature, and
his death was, until a few weeks before it took place, so
entirely unexpected, that he had had but few opportuni-
ties of making known to the world the results of his
labours. To prevent those results from being lost to
science was my main object ; and it appeared to me that
this would be effectually attained by the publication of a
Catalogue such as the present, which should embrace as
far as possible all the information he had gathered, which
is extracted from letters to his friends, from fragmentary
diaries, or from detached memorandums, as well as that
which was contained in his " Egg-book ' -this latter
being the principal record of his experience, and having
been, with some few exceptions, most carefully kept for
many years.

In order to make the catalogue more complete

"OOTHECA WOLLEYANA' 71

Newton added descriptions of specimens he received
subsequently and of the specimens in the collection
belonging to his brother Edward and himself.

The First Part of the " Ootheca Wolleyana," as the
catalogue was called, was published early in 1864, and
in his Preface Newton announced his intention of pub-
lishing the Second Part on the 1st of December of the
same year. Circumstances, however, long delayed the
preparation of the work, and it was not until 1902 that
Part II. appeared, followed closely by Parts III. and IV.
(the last) in 1905 and 1907. Though this long postpone-
ment was somewhat irritating to the expectant sub-
scribers, the succeeding parts gained greatly in value by
the delay, in that Newton was able to include eggs which
had always baffled Wolley's efforts. A great number of
these additional specimens were obtained by Wolley's
collector Knoblock, whom Newton kept in his own pay
for several years. Another circumstance which greatly
added to the extent of the work was that, whereas
Wolley's collection was confined to European species,
Newton decided to extend its limits to those of the
western half of the Palaearctic Regions, as being a district
more naturally defined : —

My foreign correspondence is growing awkwardly
large, and yet I must increase it, for I am bent upon
having every egg that is to be got before the publication
of the " O.W." and I am trying to make Greenland, Spain,
India, and Russia disgorge their ovarian possessions.

In a " Retrospective Note " (November 20, 1906)
Newton wrote :

Thankful as I am at being able to complete this
work, my feeling is rather of regret than satisfaction, for,
owing to the length of time which has elapsed since the
first part of it appeared, so few of Mr. Wolley's personal
friends are left to see its conclusion, and this Catalogue

72 THE IBIS

is largely a record of ancient friendships. My only con-
solation is that the protracted delay has not been my own
fault, as I can honestly say that whenever the cessation
of more important duties gave me opportunity, I resumed
my labour of love, but again and again months — not to
say years — passed without such opportunity recurring.*

The " Ootheca Wolleyana " has been well described as
a monumental work, and that it was very truly a " labour
of love " may be seen from the concluding paragraph of
the " Memoir " in Part II.

To describe John Wolley's character at any length
has not been my intention. I have tried, without the
desire of unduly exalting the value of any branch of
Natural Science, to give in outline the chief events of a
life which, if the study of God's creatures deserves
encouragement, cannot be said to have been uselessly
spent, for it added not inconsiderably to our knowledge
of them, and, if unswerving devotion to the cause of
Truth merits any praise, must be admitted to have been
honourably passed. The facts narrated here and in the
following pages are left to speak for themselves : on
them must Wolley's reputation rest. It would add little
to them to state that, in the various capacities of relative,
friend, and companion, there was little wanting in him,
for such encomiums are too often applied without due
cause. His good qualities are treasured in the recollec-
tion of those who knew him — now, alas ! dwindled to a
small number — and especially of that one of them to
whom he gave the last token of his esteem. Having
endeavoured (how imperfectly no one knows better than
myself) to discharge a duty owing to the memory of a
deeply lamented comrade, I cannot conclude this sketch
without an expression of gratitude at having been
permitted to share so largely the intimacy and confidence
of such an upright man.

* " Ootheca Wolleyana," Preface.

CHAPTER VI

VISIT TO SPITZBERGEN

THOUGH the emoluments of the Drue Drury Fellowship
were very meagre, Newton continued to do what was
considered in those days a considerable amount of
travelling. After he was elected to the Fellowship in
1855 he had visited, as we have seen, Lapland, the West
Indies, Boston, and Iceland. In the autumn of 1859 he
went, by way of Paris, where he saw the Jardin des
Plantes, to Copenhagen, to see his brother Francis Rodes
Newton.

This was merely a visit of pleasure, and he records in
a letter to his brother Edward a hunting party of a kind
which is now extinct.

One day we went over to Saroe to assist at a chasse.
Frank was made to take a gun and killed his only objet,
a roe-deer. There were 17 guns and about 50 beaters,
the latter armed with clappers. They drove a large
extent of forest, the guns being placed at " Stations,"
but the bag was limited : 5 Roedeer, 3 Hares, and 12
Foxes ! It was worth seeing once. All the " hunters '
got up extensively with game bags, couteaux de chasse,
etc. If a man comes late he gets fined, and so also if
he doesn't hold his gun up, misses a shot, shoots what
is not game, etc. Everything is conducted according to
rule, and people look as grave about it as if they were at
a funeral. The head forester reads out the return after
each drive, and at the end of the day announces the
fines. A fat Swedish Count was very heavily mulcted
for killing a Brown Owl.*

* Letter to Edward Newton, October 13, 1859.
73

74 VISIT TO SPITZBERGEN

Most of his journeys were short trips to cities on the
Continent, where he visited the local museums and made
the acquaintance of their curators. In 1860 he went to
Holland and Belgium, and in the summer of 1861 to
Germany : —

I have not much to record of my wanderings. The
weather last week was insufferably hot, provoking one to
all manner of maniacal acts, even beyond those of which
the British tourist is usually guilty. I did nothing in
the way of Ornithology until I arrived in its Vaterland,
for so really Germany must be considered. I passed a
pleasant afternoon with Blasius at Brunswick, whom I
like much as a man, but I am not sure that the very
high opinion of him as a naturalist I had formed from
his writings is altogether carried out on further acquaint-
ance. Perhaps, however, his judgment is too profound to
get to the bottom of it in some few hours. I had a hearty
welcome from Baldamus, at whose parsonage I passed a
night, much pleased with his exceeding earnestness and
simplicity. At Berlin, I found in Cabanis the German
Sclater, skilled in the most abstruse mysteries of the
science, to whom you and I, poor wretches, are but as
mere proselytes of the gate, but a very agreeable fellow
to meet, the vivacity of the Frenchman overpowering the
Teutonic stolidity. Blasius did me the honours of the
University collection at Brunswick, and also of his own
private one, which is rich in N. Asiatic specimens. Bal-
damus' egg-cabinet is capital, nevertheless I can regard it
without jealousy, though in numbers of species he must
far excel me. Of the wealth of the Berlin Museum I need
not speak, for it is well known. Berlin itself seems the
most terribly sleepy place I have seen for a long time.
It would puzzle the very fastest young man to find any-
thing of a Spree, barring the river, and that is one of a
most sluggish nature. But the buildings are beautiful.
I arrived here last night, or rather early this morning,
after a most tedious journey, and have spent the day in
the picture gallery, for the first time in my life giving way

HOLY ORDERS 75

to feelings of Mariolatry, brought on by my introduction
to the Madonna del Sisto, of which I could not write
without raving.*

The following year (1862) was marked by a decision
which affected profoundly his subsequent career. It had
always been his intention — with how much enthusiasm
we do not know — to take holy orders, and he was to have
been ordained by the Bishop of Ely in Advent. On his
return from a short visit to the West Indies in October
and November, he decided to abandon the idea. It is
probable, as Dr. Shipley says, that this decision " made
for peace in the Established Church " ; it is certain that
the decision made for the progress and encouragement
of Biology. It is equally certain that he did not himself
regret it later.

Miss Strickland, perhaps, was not so very far wrong
in supposing me to be a parson — for a good many years
I looked forward to that being my lot, but I am never
sufficiently thankful that it was not ; though in the
point of worldly goods I should probably have been a
comparatively rich man. In these days of rising prices
fixed incomes are a terrible institution.!

It was the custom, though it was not a strict condi-
tion, for the holder of the Drury Fellowship to take
orders, so when Newton made this decision he at once
offered to relinquish the Fellowship, but the Master of
Magdalene J allowed him to hold it until it expired on
March 25, 1863. " This is the last day I shall ever be
able to consider myself Fellow of MagdaleneJ my
fellowship ceasing this Lady Day, and henceforth Norfolk
Fellows are as clean gone as Norfolk Bustards."

* Letter to H. B. Tristram. Dresden, August 22, 1861.
t Letter to Airs. Strickland, November 9, 1872.
j Hon. and Rev. Latimer Neville, afterwards 9th Lord Braybrooke.
§ Newton was elected in 1877 to a Professorial Fellowship at Magdalene,
which he held until the time of his death.

76 VISIT TO SPITZBERGEN

In the meantime Newton's father had died, and his
home at Elveden was sold to the Maharaja Dhuleep Singh.
" We are much disappointed at the price this place
fetched. His Highness got it £5000 under the actually
appraised value, and I dare not say how much under
what we put it at ; so that our Sikh has not proved such
a great find after all." Newton had the greatest affection
for the place where he had been brought up, and he
could never be persuaded to revisit it. Ten years later,
when he was staying with Lord Walsingham at Merton :

Dhuleep Singh came over and we all went to Stanford
Mere. About a month before he went shooting ducks
there and wading lost a diamond said to be worth between
£2000 and £3000 from a ring, and this he wants to find.
Accordingly they have let the waters off to lay dry the
line he took, and the soil is to be taken up, stacked like
peat and sifted ! . . . Really in a very delicate way he
asked me if I would go and stay at Elden, saying he
should be glad to see any of the family, but I, of course,
told him there would be as much pain as pleasure in
doing so, and this he seemed fully to appreciate.

Excepting a short visit to Belgium in the summer of
that year, the greater part of 1863 was spent in family
business and in moving his belongings and his own and
Wolley's collections to Cambridge, which was thence-
forward to be his permanent home.

When some thirty years hence a discerning Minister
of Public Worship ascertains that you will be the right
man in the right place if seated on the throne of Canter-
bury (or say York, if you are not too fastidious), you will
then find that the sifting of thirty years' Natural History
accumulations is a labour of that kind which people who
are not afflicted with hay-fever say " is not to be sneezed
at." You will therefore I hope duly value these few
lines, written amid an abomination of desolation. Tow
was perhaps known in the days of Hercules, but cotton

UNPACKING EGGS 77

wool certainly was not, and I am sure he would not have
performed the labour Augaeus set him, had he been
suffering from acute chortismus aggravated by breathing
an atmosphere so thickly charged with lino-byssal fila-
ments, that you might almost roll up an egg with safety
in it. Under such circumstances I proceed to answer
your letter. I only wonder I am not driven quite mad
and do not dream I am a Gare-fowl's egg about to be
involved in a winding sheet of cotton wool and stored
away for ever in the inmost and most secure compartment
of one of my yellow Lapland coffers.*

In the summer of the following year he joined his
friend Edward Birkbeck (afterwards Sir E. B.) in a
voyage to Spitsbergen. Nowadays that island may be
visited every summer by any tourist who likes to pay
sufficient gold to Messrs. Cook, but in the early " sixties '
the voyage was a difficult and indeed a somewhat
perilous undertaking, and the story of Newton's adven-
tures, told in the following letters to his brother Edward,
has a certain historical value.

Sultana, R.T.Y.C., Hammerfest,

June 30, 1864.

Here I am once more at the place which I think I
hate most in the world ; but I am bound to say that my
second stay here has been more agreeable than my first
was ; for in 1855 the snow was only beginning to go, and
it rained or snowed ten days out of the eleven I passed
here. Now the snow is all but gone and the weather
really pleasant. To-day it is actually hot and I am
writing this with my waistcoat open while on deck ; the
sun is powerful enough for anything, though there is a
good S.E. breeze. Yesterday the post steamer from the
south arrived bringing me a cheery letter from M. and
yours of the 1st May. Before I answer this, however, I
will tell you of our outward voyage. We left Lowestoft

* Letter to F. B. Tristram, July 11, 1863.

78 VISIT TO SPITZBERGEN

on the 1st June and arrived at Aberdeen on the 4th.
There we had to take in various stores, water, etc., and
did not get away till the morning of the 7th. We had a
fair wind to start with, but it dropped towards the after-
noon, and then we had a succession of head winds, calms,
fogs, etc., so that we did not sight the cost of Norway
(Bremangerland) until the afternoon of the 9th. That
night we were blown off again with half a gale, and then
had a repetition of calms, etc., so that we did not get
into Christiansund until the 13th. We sailed again the
next day, having got a coast pilot, and on the 20th reached
Svolvaer on one of the Lofoten islands. There we took
another pilot as far as Tromso, and then a third to this
place, where we arrived on the 26th, being a victim to
head winds and calms the whole way ; most provoking
when time has been an object. The next day Birkbeck
set to work about getting a jagt to accompany us to
Spitzbergen. Luckily there was one nearly ready, and
still more luckily, though she was built for the purpose,
she has never yet made a voyage, so we shall be spared
the sickening stink of putrid blubber. She is to be (and
I think will be) fit by the day after to-morrow, when I
hope we shall sail in company for the Sound. Arrived
there we shall go on board her and leaving the yacht in
a safe place proceed to do as best we can. The accom-
modation on board the Semmoline is as you may suppose
not very luxurious. She is about 40 tons, one cabin only,
large enough for four people to lie down in, but not high
enough to stand up in. The fo 'castle allows of four
hammocks being slung ; we have ten men as crew, so
where the fifth who is not on watch will sleep I don't
know, or Ludwig (whom I mean to take on board) either !
but I suppose they will manage it somehow. There is a
small stove in the after cabin, at which we must cook,
and we have two whale-boats to be manned by four men,
— one of whom is a harpooner, — each. It will be
roughish work, but we shall enjoy the comfort of the
Sultana all the more when we get back. I am not at all
sanguine as to my success in things ornithological ; our

VOYAGE TO HAMMEKFEST 79

tedious voyage here has lessened the chance of eggs
almost to nil, and according to Malmgren (the ornitholo-
gist of the Swedish expedition, begun some three years
ago and still being carried on) the good things that have
been reported from Spitzbergen are fabulous ; neither
Larus sabini nor L. rossi have ever revealed themselves
to him.

The hire of our jagt for two months costs Birkbeck
£200, but this is to cover all expenses, and leave the entire
catch in his hands, which may be worth some £40 or £50.
It is supposed to be a cheap bargain. Lament's expedi-
tion must have cost him a good deal more, and when
young T. Thornhill went with Ld. Dunmore they paid
£120 for six weeks, and only six men and one boat. All
the people here are now crazy about shark fishing. Last
year it was very productive between the N. Cape and
Bear Island, and our jagt was going there had not Birk-
beck hired her. One or two vessels have already returned
with full cargoes and are off again. This place looks more
thriving than it did nine years ago, but yet the largest
' house " smashed some twelve months since. Wolley's
old friend, Andreas Berger, the man who used to declare
he had sailed to the north of 83°, has taken to drink and
has been sent by his brothers to America, where he now
serves in the U.S. Navy. There are only about three
people that I remember formerly, and no one that I care
about. As yet we have done nothing ornithological. I
sent Ludwig out one day here to get some ptarmigan,
they are very large on this island, but he returned without
seeing a bird. He is off again to-day at his own request,
and I think means to distinguish himself.

Our party continues to be a very pleasant one. The
Dr. (Wagstaff by name) and Lorange,the interpreter, both
good fellows in their way, and Manners Sutton great fun
at times. Birkbeck is rather too quiet and it is difficult
at times to make out if he is not greatly bored with the
whole thing. I dare say that occasionally he feels the
want of the constant occupation he has been accustomed
to, and certainly being on board a sailing vessel in a

80 VISIT TO SPITZBERGEN

dead calm when you are in a hurry is not a cheerful
business ; but I like him altogether very much. I only
wish he would smoke, an accomplishment he is not equal
to, though here it is almost a positive duty ; for nothing
can be more disgusting than the smell of boiling blubber
on shore ; or if that operation is not going on, there is
always stock-fish.

Trondhjem,

September 7, 1864.

We have returned actually without any one of our
party setting eyes upon a Bear, a Walrus, or what to my
mind was as bad, even a Lagopus liemileucurus ! Nor in
the egg way has my success been even tolerable. Not a
single Grey Phalarope's, — I never saw but one bird alive,
but I believe it is not otherwise than numerous, though
extremely local. The only point on which I think I have
determined, and which is of any importance, is that the
large species of Goose which frequents the Sound (and I
dare say other localities) is the Pink-footed Goose ; but
even of this I was unable to get an adult specimen,
though I saw two in the possession of Malmgren, the
Swedish naturalist, who was up there with the Scientific
Expedition. All the same I shall never repent of having
gone, still less of having taken Ludwig with me. It is
almost a new world to have seen. I must also record
among our captures nearly 50 Reindeer, and about a
dozen Seals, mostly large ones.

Now that you may understand our movements I must
draw you a map, for there is not one in existence that
can be at all relied on, and we have been to many places
which have never yet been mapped at all.

Cambridge, September 25, 1864.

The day after I dispatched my letter to you from
Hammerfest, I wrent out to sail and shoot in Hammerfest
Bay. We saw a large flock of Long-tailed Ducks, and I
got 4 at 3 shots ; they did not appear to be breeding, but
were immature birds that had never properly moulted.

TO SPITZBERGEN 81

On the evening of July 2, the Semmoline, the
Norwegian jagt that Birkbeck hired, got under way ;
we followed the next morning (Sunday, the 3rd) — •
rendezvous Straednaes, or in case of the Stor Fjord being
blocked, Ice Sound — with Stabbel, who was pilot one
year on board the Recherche, the French exploring expedi-
tion, on board acting in the same capacity for us ; he
had been about 30 times to Spitzbergen and, as we found,
he knew the country very well. In the afternoon we
overtook our consort, and having (for us) a fair wind, she
was almost out of sight by 10 o'clock p.m.

July 4. We saw Fulmars for the first time on the
voyage.

5th. Supposed to be near Bear Island, but we saw
nothing of it, it was hazy ; large quantities of birds.
Some of the Guillemots appeared to me to be different
from the U. troile.

6th. No observation ; sighted land (Syd Cap) about
5.30 p.m., bearing N.E. ; 6 p.m., much drift ice ; 7 p.m.
the same. 11 p.m., much more ice sighted, bearing
from N.N.W to S.E., and quite high, indicating that Stor
Fjord was choked ; accordingly altered course to N.W.
Of course, the first meeting with the ice was immense
excitement ; everybody aloft except myself and the man
at the wheel, and a wonderful sight it was to see the
blocks drifting down slowly, at first small bits and far
apart, then bigger and closer, until at last it looked like
one close pack. We were much disappointed ; having
met with no ice about Bear Island, we had thought we
should certainly find nothing in Stor Fjord to stop us.
Thermometer in air, 33°, in water 40°, until we passed
by the first bit of ice, when it fell in a quarter of an
hour to 32°.

July 7. Thick and no observation. 9 a.m., sighted
land from E. to N.E. Noon, land breaking out from
E. to N. 7 p.m., pilot recognized S. point of Bell Sound.
10 p.m., hove-to in thick fog ; very cold. Midnight,
steered for Bell Sound ; land faintly visible at times.

July 8, 2 a.m. On nearing Bell Sound found it full

G

82 VISIT TO SPITZBERGEN

of ice. 2.40 a.m., stood out ; fresh breeze and tumbling
sea. 5 a.m., hove-to ; thick with snow, very cold.
4 a.m., air 33°, water 31° ! 10.30 a.m. spoke the Lisa
of Hammerfest who reported Ice Sound clear and gave
us a shoulder of venison. Afternoon, sighted land.
4 p.m., S. point of Ice Sound bearing E.S.E. ; fresh
breeze. 7 p.m., sighted entrance to Ice Sound, two or
three belts of drift ice right across. 8.30, passed through
1st (or 1st and 2nd) belt ; Captain and pilot steering
the ship from the rigging. 10 p.m., passed through 2nd
belt (or 3rd), which was not so thick, but heavier. Birds
innumerable begin to show themselves ; mostly Brun-
nich's Guillemot, Northern Puffin, and Little Auk, a herd
of White Whales, their ivory whiteness contrasting
prettily with the colours of the ice, which was dazzling
white and all shades of green and blue. 11.30 p.m., lost
the breeze, lowered both boats to tow the ship. Occasional
floes of ice, covered with Glaucous Gull, Kittiwake, and
Fulmar, passing quite close to the shore on N. side of
Sound. Under the Alkenhorn saw flocks of Geese,
Brent, and a larger species ; lots of Eider Ducks. Ropes
slightly frozen although the sun was shining brightly —
not exactly on us.

July 9, 2.20 a.m. Came to anchor in Safe Haven,
found schooner from Tromso with Swedish Expedition
on board. Lorange and I went to call and knocked up
Duner, the astronomer. His colleagues Nordenskjold and
Malmgren had been absent 12 days up the Sound in a
boat ; he supposed they were beset, but was not uneasy
about them. 10 a.m., Birkbeck and Manners Sutton in
cutter with pilot and two hands to Coal Bay, which they
found full of ice. (They returned next morning with 3
Deer and a Red-necked Phalarope.) Before they started
I saw the first Ivory Gull, which got a piece of meat from
the Swede and came and ate it on a block of ice close by.
M. Sutton shot it with my gun. The Doctor, Lorange,
and I with Ludwig to land under Alkenhorn. I shot
some Fulmars, Glaucous Gull, N. Puffin, etc. I made
Ludwig walk along near the shore, in hopes of getting

FOXES, EIDERS, AND REINDEER 83

Geese ; but he saw none. I took a higher line, where the
walking seemed better, but it was extremely bad going-
bogs and big stones. Dr. and L. tried to get up the cliff ;
found it impossible. We all met for luncheon about a
mile or so from the point, and I watched a Snow Bunting
to its nest, which we got after hard work ; 4 eggs, 2 much
damaged. Ludwig soon after found another ; 6 eggs,
ready to hatch. He then tried to get up the cliff to the
East of the Horn, and thought it accessible with a rope.
Myriads of Guillemots and Little Auks. Foxes perpetu-
ally barking on cliff. L. saw one but could not get
within shot. Home to Sultana and after dinner row
towards Glacier at head of Haven ; shot Little Auk, and
L. had another Fox-hunt, over loose snow with slippers
on ! Swede sends us a Deer.

July 10, Sunday. M. Sutton and I with Ludwig
went to the Eiderstone, got about 60 eggs, all fresh ;
later in the day some of the crew went again and got
about 30 more, and the last thing at night Ludwig went
off once more and brought back 12 ! Constant ice-falls
like thunder all day.

July 11. Another jagt from Tromso put in early.
Birkbeck hired a whale-boat and crew, in which he, M.
Sutton, and Lorange set off to the South side of the
Fjord ; the Dr. and I following in the skiff manned by
three of the Sultana's crew. A fine day with fresh breeze
in middle of Fjord ; good deal of ice coming down. Dr.
shoots at a big seal which was lying asleep on a floe, but
the brute woke up and rolled off into the water just
before the bullet struck the ice. The whale-boat beats
us hollow, but we overtook her as they landed to prospect
a valley opening E. of the true Alkenfels. No Deer in it ;
then on to another valley where 3 Deer were seen. I
crawled up with Birkbeck within rifle shot of them, but
he missed ! I had no rifle at all and 1 never shot at a
deer, as I did not think Horace's old gun would be safe
with a bullet. Subsequently the Tromso jagtsman killed
one. We brought a tent on shore and camped out in
' Birkbeck Dale." M. Sutton made a good fire with

84 VISIT TO SPITZBERGEN

drift wood and proved to be a very good cook. Ice in
evening coming down Fjord and getting aground just
below our camp. Very cold at night. Guillemots and
Little Auks flying high overhead to cliffs 3 or 4 miles
inland,

July 12. In boats to Advent Bay. Found an old
Russian Hut with smoke coming out of chimney. On
landing found 3 Norwegians, who with 7 others had been
shipwrecked off Pr. Charles' Foreland about six weeks
before ; the other 7 had gone on board a jagt they met.
These three came on here to shoot Deer. They looked
pretty happy, though one had a frightful abscess on his
arm. They had lost their reckoning and asked the day
of the month and week ! Saw Deer on other side of Bay.
Birkbeck and M. Sutton after them in skiff. B. missed
again. Dr. Lorange, and I in whale-boat towards head
of Bay, find some fast ice and a flock of Brent ; I had a
shotwith M. S.'s big rifle, but missed. Lots of Eiders and
N. Pufnns. Just as we came to land saw 3 deer on hill
not 500 yards off. Two minutes after Birkbeck came
round stalking them ; M. S. and Norwegian followed.
Birkbeck knocked over two, right and left, but one got
up again and with the third trotted of! slowly towards a
pass where the Norwegian lay. He killed the unwounded
one and then showing himself drove the wounded deer
down to where I was with the Dr. and Lorange. The
latter got tremendously excited and though it was quite
clear the poor beast was done for, could not be restrained
from shooting it again, hitting it in the haunch ! Im-
mediately afterwards he rushed upon it with his rifle
clubbed to hit it on the head, but Birkbeck and I called at
him so that he gave up that idea and took to stoning it.
At last the Dr. came up and throwing the beast stuck it.
After that we pitched the tent. B. again went after
another deer, but returned without a shot. Just before
turning in I shot an Ivory Gull. Not quite so cold that
night, but we saw the ice coming back up the Fjord, and
next morning at 5 a.m., we found a thick fog and the
Bay full of ice. B. off again after Deer, while we struck

SWEDISH EXPEDITION 85

the tent and got ready to be off, for we were afraid we
might be beset. Of course, he got none, as you could
scarcely see 50 yards. About 9 a.m., we got under way ;
the Dr. and I in the skiff as before. It was not easy to
find the way, but the Norwegians rowed as if by instinct
and our crew followed as best they could. When we got
within sight of the Russian Hut, we found another big
boat, which turned out to be Nordenskjold and Malmgren,
who had been released two days before and were on their
way back to Safe Haven. We fraternised, of course.
They had been for some time quite out of biscuit and
tobacco, with both of which we were able to supply them.
Malmgren had a wild Goose, which I saw at once was
Ans&r brachyrliynchus !

The fog still continued, but the Swedes said they
meant to go home that day and invited us to follow,
which we did. We soon got out of sight of land and had
to steer by compass ; indeed, at one time we in the skiff
lost both the other boats ; but by holding on our course
came up to them again. We had had to diverge on
account of the ice, and our crew could not pull the skiff
as fast as the whale-boats went. About the middle of
the Fjord it cleared, and the fog holding to the S. side
we saw our way home well enough. A most fatiguing
pull for the men, at least 30 miles from our camp to the
yacht, and the tide against us most part of the way, yet
we did arrive at last about 9 o'clock p.m. Found that
Ludwig had been unable to do anything on the Alkenhorn
even with rope and men.

14th. Rest day ; the Swedes dine with us and very
good fellows they were. Malmgren readily accepted my
correction of his error about the Goose, which he had
taken to be Anser segetum. He showed me another
specimen and gave me two eggs. Showed me also a
c? Lagopus, the only one he had got.

July 15. Birkbeck, M. S.,and Lorange to Coal Bay
in Tromso jagt's boat. (They returned next day with
1 Deer and 2 $ Phalaropus platyrhynchus, M. S. sure
that they were breeding on flat grassy land with pools of

86 VISIT TO SPITZBERGEN

water on W. side of the Bay.) Capt., Dr., and I in skiff
to Alkenhorn ; on way found Semmoline coming in,
boarded her, she had been in the ice and knocked off
some of her sheathing which would have to be replaced.
Ludwig found an egg of Fulmar carried off and sucked
by a Skua or Glaucous. Coming back a seal followed us ;
Dr. and I gave him three barrels each, when he splashed
about and we were lucky enough to get him into the
boat ; the small species, Phoca fcetida or hispida, about
4 ft. long. In evening Dr. and I to Swedish schooner to
consult Malmgren as to species of seal. As I was getting
on board the dinghy slipped away before I had hold of
accommodation ladder and down I went ; water not so
cold as I should have thought (36°), and as I kept my pipe
in my mouth I lost nothing.* Went back to yacht and
changed. Duner and Nordenskjold called to inquire how
I was and brought some Terns' eggs. They sat talking
and drinking grog till late. Heard from them a good
deal about the N., which they had surveyed some years
before. N. recommends our going there for Walrus.

July 16. None the worse for my ducking. On shore
on E. side of Haven to get fossils. Ludwig walked over
ridge and came back having found a nest of Anser
brachyrhynchus, 2 young just hatched ; bad luck. Also
a breeding-place, accessible, of Little Auk. Sent Ludwig
off again to try and shoot old Geese. Dr. shot and missed,
brought young birds. (N.B., they have each a few
feathers on their feet !) The Swedes left about midnight ;
Lorange and M. S. on board to see the last of them for
some hours. They came home singing and were not
easily prevailed upon to go to bed. M. S. humbugged
Malmgren into the belief that he also was an egg-collector
and got some given him : Glaucous, Pink-footed Goose,
and also a very fine pair of Deer horns.

July 17, Sunday. Tried to hire Tromso boat to go to
Coal Bay to look for Phalaropes, but they insisted on

1 He said afterwards that this was the only action of his life of which he
was proud. " Most men," he said, " would at least have opened their
mouths to say ' Ah ! '

SEALS 87

sailing. A great bore but can't be helped. After dinner,
B., M. S., Lorange, and I on board Semmoline to go to
Mittel Hook, etc. Ice pack in Fjord and water freezing ;
some bumps in the night.

July 18. 8 a.m., Semmoline anchored in Advent
Bay, wind very fresh. B. and M. S. each in whale-boat
after Deer. I stayed on board. B. saw a large stag but
did not get a shot. M. S. killed three. Ivory Gulls and
other birds about.

July 19. 10 a.m., weighed anchor. About 11, B.
and Lorange in boat to Mittel Hook. M. S. and I in other
boat along shore to Eastward. Met a large seal, Phoca
barbata, which after three shots from M. S.was harpooned;
a most exciting capture, men not knowing their business
nearly capsised us. Harpoon slipped first time and had
to be thrown again. Beast very ferocious, dragging boat
through water at great pace, and coming up alongside as
if he would board us. What must a Walrus be ? He
was about 11 ft. long and took a deal of killing. Fulmars
come and sit on water close by during operation. Wind
rising. Landed, 5 p.m., on point just outside Sassen
Bay, a quicksand and frozen beach above it. Looked
out for Phalaropes ; saw none. M. S. up valley for Deer ;
no luck. Ked-throated Diver came quite close to me.
Rigged up sails and turned over boat for shelter, as it
was very cold notwithstanding a good fire. About
10 p.m., got boat off and stood out for Semmoline about
5 miles off. White Whales again. Perhaps lucky we
could not harpoon one as they are very strong ; but tried
our best. Rain nearly all the way.

July 20. Arrived on board Semmoline soon after
midnight. Wind increasing ; ran for Advent Bay ;
could not do it, then 'bout ship and make for Sassen
Bay ; anchored behind headland. Gale increasing.
B. and M. S. on shore in evening ; 4 Deer.

July 21. Strong wind, can't get away. B. and M. S.
on shore again ; 5 Deer. Other boat with skipper to
eastward ; they returned next day ; 6 Deer.

July 22. Left Semmoline at 11 a.m., in boat, as wind

88 VISIT TO SPITZBERGEN

had moderated ; reached Sultana in Safe Haven about
8.30 ; found they had had worse weather than ourselves.

July 23. Semmoline arrived at noon. With Ludwig
on shore to eastward ; found two Little Auks' nests and
got big young ones out. Shown site of Goose's nest.
Fossil and plant hunting. Semmoline off at 5 p.m. B.
built cairn on W. side and deposited record. Sultana
off at 6 p.m.

24th, Sunday. Becalmed ; foggy. Semmoline van-
ished. By noon off Bell Sound. Spoke a jagt from the
N. with 80 walrus and 90 seals !

July 25. Calm and fine ; jagts in company.

July 26. Do., Do., Do. Little drift ice between
Bell and Horn Sounds.

27th. Calm morning, foggy. 2 p.m., heavy cross
sea rising ; opening Syd Cap in company.

28th. High sea ; boats got in and made snug.
Wind dropped as day got on and calm in afternoon.

29th. Calm and foggy. About 15 miles from S.
Cape. Semmoline becalmed in-shore. M. S. shot a big
seal (Ph. barbata) from deck and he was duly harpooned.
Thick fog in evening.

July 30. Breeze from eastward, very cold ; dripping
fog, clearing a little at times. Breeze freshened towards
evening, but fog thick, so lay-to.

July 31, 9 a.m. Semmoline close by ; ordered to keep
within sight ; fog all day ; consort generally not a
100 yards off.

August 1. Fog as before. Do. consort. Met ice
in evening.

August 2. 1 a.m., thick fog ; large quantities of ice.
Hove-to along with consort, whom we soon after lost
sight of as she drifted to leeward. Supposed to be about
half way between S. Cape and Hope Island. Sounding
all day.

August 3. Fog as before ; wind easterly ; miserably
cold ; everything wet through. A few birds in evening.

August 4. Dripping fog as before. About 5 p.m.,
wind got Northerly and fog lifted showing Vallis Pt.

ICE 89

lying N.E. by N. 7 p.m., sighted Semmoline off land.
11.30 p.m., spoke her and made arrangements for next
day. We had been so very crowded and uncomfortable
before, that I decided not to go as M. S. was most anxious
about it, and B. was helpless without Lorange. His
intention was to be back in a week for supplies, etc. ; we
were to rendezvous at Straedmaes, supposed to be open,
and I thought I should then have my turn.

August 5. Transhipping stores, bedding, etc., to
Semmoline all morning ; about noon B., M. S., and
Lorange off on board her. Sultana made sail for Straed-
maes. Light wind ; lots of seals, ' springers," Phoca
groenlandica, in strings, jumping out of the water and
looking like the Sea-serpent.

August 6. Beating up Stor Fjord ; wind N.N.W.
and very light ; a big iceberg floating about undecidedly.
Noon, much ice across. 3 p.m., reached ice and sailed
about 2 miles through it. Pilot declared it ' ' fast ' ' a
little further up, were within 20 miles of Straedmaes.
Watered from the ice, as we were running short ; then
stood out to S.W. Lots of seals all day, mostly Phoca
groenlandica ; Ivory Gulls were numerous ; Dr. in boat
shot 10, I from deck shot 3.

Sunday, August 7. Calm. Seals very numerous and
tame ; mostly the small species to-day. Several Ivory
Gulls. Mirage of " fast " ice all along the west shore
of Stor Fjord. Snow in evening.

August 8. Light air. Making for Thousand Islands
to look for driftwood, being nearly out of fuel. 9 p.m.
Anchored about 3 miles N. of Russo. Dr. on shore ;
sent Ludwig with him.

August 9. 1 a.m., Dr. returned with wood and birds.
Ludwig shot 2 Phalaropes and thought he knew where
there must be a nest. 9 a.m., I went ashore ; flushed
a female from nearly the same place ; never saw her
again, though I waited for an hour or two and afterwards
walked all over the island. Lots of Terns breeding ;
found eggs fresh. Red-throated Divers also, but did not
find their nest. Gnats humming and almost inclined to

90 VISIT TO SPITZBERGEN

bite. Afternoon ; got under way again, but cairn, and
adverse tide, so at 8 p.m. anchored.

August 10. 1.30., tried once more to reach Round
Island. 3.0, sighted Semmoline. 4 a.m., they all came
on board. They had cruised among the Thousand
Islands and landed on Ryk Island without seeing walrus or
bear. From the latter place all was ice to the N. They
then stood out to the eastward in hopes of finding a
channel, and sighted Gillies' Land, the country English
geographers don't believe in. Ice came drifting down
upon them 9 knots an hour and they had to run. They
got 7 seals.

7 a.m., Semmoline anchored alongside ; transhipped
baggage.

10 a.m., both vessels ofi for Ice Sound again.
Tumbling sea ; N.E. wind ; rain and snow ; thick
evening.

August 11. 2 a.m., sighted land. Strong wind with
snow. 6 a.m., hauled up for S. Cape. 8.0, rounded S.
Cape. Much heavy ice. Noon : constantly running to
S.W., skirting ice. Semmoline still ahead ; with a wind
" straight in behind ' she can go faster than Sultana.
Fine evening. Water at noon, 34° ; at 7 p.m., 43°.
(Gulf Stream ?)

August 12. Fresh breeze, and fine. Keeping away
still S.W. (N.B. — On my map I have not allowed for our
deviations, but merely put the general course) to avoid
tongues of ice. Pilot very desponding about ice ; thinks
it is all coming up behind us from the N.E., and will run
up the W. coast. It turned out afterwards that he
mistook the land about Horn Sound for Bell Sound, 40
miles further up. We had not had a good look at it.
Pike-headed Whales playing about and under ship.

August 13. Still bearing to westward to avoid ice ;
light airs.

Sunday, August 14. Standing up for Ice Fjord.
11 a.m., sighted Semmoline astern. Fresh breeze blowing
out of Sound. 2 jagts in Green Harbour. 3 p.m.,
towing with boats. 5, anchored in Safe Haven, nearly

LEAVING SPITZBERGEN 91

in old place. Snow much diminished. On shore to W.
side ; found old Russian Hut, flagstaff, etc., which had
been covered up on former visit. B. and M. S. found
Norwegian graves. After dinner on shore on E. side,
sketching and getting plants.

August 15. Semmoline arrived. B., M. S., Dr., and
Lorange in her to Coal Bay. I did not go as I thought
it was useless looking there for eggs, and I can't manage
Deer-stalking. Rainy day with wind.

August 16. Capt. and I with Ludwig to Russian
Hut ; find more graves. Get Red Snow plants, etc. ;
afterwards to Alkenhorn, caught young Uria brunnichi
and got other birds. Shot 2 Ivory Gulls, right and left,
in evening.

August 17. Calm. Salt water round ship froze at
4 a.m. ; wind rising, let go 2nd anchor ; did not leave
ship. Strong gale at midnight.

August 18. Gale moderating. To Eiderstone with
Ludwig. More than 12 nests still unoccupied ; one
hatching ; lots of down.

August 19. Calm and sunny. On shore to N.W. of
Haven ; found shells, etc. Scraping ship's sides and
watering. Fresh water on deck frozen at night.

August 20. On shore at Fossil Ridge, collecting
fossils and plants. Ludwig out later seal shooting ; no
luck.

Sunday, August 21. 3.30, Semmoline returned with
19 Deer, 11 Brent Geese, etc. ; nothing particular.
7 a.m., weighed anchor ; wind light. 4 p.m., thick fog.
Lost sight of Spitzbergen.

August 22. Light wind. Saw last Ivory Gull.

August 23. Moderate wind. Saw last Glaucous Gull.

August 24. Light wind. Spoke Nora of Hammer-
fest shark-fishing ; one hauled up as we passed. Sighted
Bear Island on port beam about 3.30 p.m.

August 25, 3 a.m. Again sighted Bear Island. Light
N.W. breeze. First stars seen.

August 26. Very light wind ; much warmer. Sighted
land in afternoon.

92 VISIT TO SPITZBERGEN

August 27. Anchored at Hammerfest at 4 p.m., and
got our letters.

So ends my Spitzbergen journal. I found the mail
steamer going to sail at 1 a.m. on the 28th (Sunday) and
went on board her. At Tromso I parted with Ludwig,
with great regret. He is the handiest and most obliging
fellow I ever had to do with, and you may speak to him
just as you would to a companion and he does not
presume upon it. He was to start next day for Bals
Fjord, whence he would walk across to Mukkanoma and
so get to Muoniovara.

Of my voyage down the coast of Norway I need not
say much ; it was not a pleasant one. The country is
thriving and the people are not improved by it. The
merchants are as boorish as Germans, and the lower
classes as extortionate as Jews. They all spit infinitely
worse than Yankees. The Prinds Gustav is a small
steamer constructed to carry about 15 cabin passengers
and we had nearly 40. The further south we came, the
more people came on board, and the closer every door,
port and window were shut. To make matters worse,
the winter hours were adopted and we scarcely ever ran
at night ; this made the voyage three days longer.

CHAPTER VII

DR. SHIPLEY'S REMINISCENCES

By the Master of Christ's, Sir A. E. Shipley, G.B.E., F.R.S.

NEWTON was admitted a member of Magdalene College
in the spring of 1848, the entry in the admission book
running as follows : —

Maii 30, 1848

Alfred Newton, films Gulielmi Newton de Eldon Hall
in comitatu Norfolkiensi, armigeri, et uxoris ejus ElizcB
Milnes privatim institutus, annos natus XIX admissus
est Pensionarius

Tvtoribus I ™v' Warter"
( V. Kaven.

His name appears for the first time in the Calendar
for 1849, and he apparently came into residence in the
October Term of the previous year. Altogether there
were about sixty students residing at Magdalene at that
time, including four sizars, and two " Ten-year men," a
class of student which is now as extinct as the dodo.
They were usually, but not always, country clergy, who
by keeping one term in each of ten years and passing the
necessary examinations obtained a degree.

The Cambridge he came up to was very different from
the Cambridge of to-day. It is even possible that he
arrived on a coach or in a post-chay, for the railway line
to Norfolk was only opened three years before, and the
unlovely station which stands to-day much as it stood
seventy years ago, was only built in 1845. At first it
was provided with the usual two platforms, and no one

93

94 DR. SHIPLEY'S REMINISCENCES

seems now to know why one of these was done away
with, and the platform so elongated that passengers
perform a perceptible part of their journey on foot.

Still in those days people were easily pleased, and the
author of the " Pictorial Guide to Cambridge " (1867),
after referring to coaching as a still extant but semi-
barbarous mode of transit, breaks into the following
rhapsody over our Railway Station :

The progress of the train has ceased, the re-
bounding of the carriages coming to a state of rest
is over, the voices of porters and the opening of
doors has commenced, and here we are standing on
the pavement of the Cambridge station. What a
surprise ! I had no idea of such a length of building,
all covered over, and comfortable ; it cannot be
much less than four hundred feet. This is really
one of the best stations I have seen for many a day.
But how is it the stream of passengers is dividing ?
Oh, I see, one half are taking themselves off to that
handsome refreshment room, and the other half are
passing through the building to trudge on foot into
the town, or to indulge themselves with a cheap ride
to the same place.

When Newton came into residence the Master of
Magdalene was the Hon. and Very Reverend George
Neville Grenville, Dean of Windsor, who had been
appointed in 1813. He and his successor, the Hon.
and Rev. Latimer Neville, later Lord Braybrooke,
presided over the College for ninety-one years. The
Tutors were E. Warter and V. Raven, and Mynors
Bright, a well-known authority on "Pepys' Diary " was
Lecturer in Classics, Dean and Praelector. At that time
there were but four Foundation Fellows in the College,
but there were no less than thirteen " by " Fellowships,
though three of these were vacant in 1849. The by-

UNDERGRADUATE DAYS 95

Fellows all received some small emolument from one or
other of eight separate Foundations, which were con-
solidated under the statutes of 1882, when the emolu-
ments of these Foundations were merged in the general
funds of the College. As was the habit of the times,
nearly all the Fellows were in holy orders and many
of them non-resident.

There is little record of Newton as an undergraduate,
but there is at least one significant fact. He was at that
time notable for his English Essays, and I believe won
a College prize in this subject. It is sometimes said that
men of science cannot write English. I don't believe it.
Certainly they can and do write better English than
literary men write Science. But in any case, Newton
was a master of words ; they never dominated him. He
used few, mostly Anglo-Saxon words, but he used them
with an expert's sense of their meaning. In this, as in
other aspects of his work, he showed a quite peculiar
sense of the just and the fitting.

Whilst an undergraduate at Magdalene, Newton oc-
cupied the rooms which later were made fireproof and
now house the Pepysian Library. He was never in the
technical sense a scholar of the College, in fact, he took
a " Poll degree," but after taking his degree, the College
Order-book of 1854 records :

Ego Alfred Newton admissus fui in sodalitium hujus
Collegii pro Magistro Drury.

This was a Fellowship known as the ' Norfolk
travelling Fellowship," and restricted to those whose
fathers belonged to the county of Norfolk ; but the
holder was not a Foundation Fellow The funds at the
disposal of the Norfolk Fellow were later merged in the
general funds of the College when the new statutes of
1882 were sanctioned by Parliament. It was only in
1877, when he had held the Professorship of Zoology and

96 DR. SHIPLEY'S REMINISCENCES

Comparative Anatomy for eleven years, that he became
a Foundation Fellow.

The town to which Newton came up in his nineteenth
year was much smaller than to-day. The population in
1851 was 27,815 ; to-day, with the extensions of the
town boundaries which have taken place since the be-
ginning of this century, it reaches the figure of 55,812
The University also has more than doubled its size. In
1849 there were 1775 undergraduates, 3786 members of
the Senate, and 6906 members of the University " on the
Boards " ; to-day the numbers are 3623, 7293, and
15,094 respectively.* The distribution of the students,
too, has altered ; in those days Pembroke had but 23
undergraduates all told, Magdalene just over 50.

The appearance of the town was almost mediaeval.
There were but few houses — barely a dozen — south of
Parker's Piece ; Romsey Town, New Chesterton, and
Newnham hardly existed ; and to the north the " hand-
some and commodious shirehouse ' opened in 1842
almost coincided with the limits of the borough along
the Huntingdon Road. To make way for this Court of
Justice the last relic of the Castle, a massive and spacious
gate-house, was removed. The older buildings of the
Observatory looked then much as they look now, but
the married Don was then unthought-of, and the in-
numerable red-brick villas which stretch yearly further
towards the setting sun, between the Madingley and the
Barton Roads were undreamt of. There was no Selwyn,
no Ridley Hall, no Girton, no Newnham, no Westminster
or Cheshunt Colleges, and no Clergy-Training School,
also there was no Theatre.

The Fitzwilliam Museum stood unfinished with the

* This was written in June, 1914. The numbers at present (November,
1920) are 4776, 7780, and 15,862 respectively.

CAMBRIDGE IN 1850 97

then much smaller Addenbrooke's Hospital almost
opposite. The Fitzwilliam art collections, which had
been housed in the old Perse School in Free School Lane,
were still being exhibited in 1848 in the east room of
the University Library. The old College buildings still
stood at Pembroke, and small houses occupied the site
of the existing College buildings now facing Trumpington
Street to the south of the Chapel. Waterhouse's
" structures " were not built until the early 'seventies,
and Scott's beautiful court in Pembroke Street not until
1883. In the middle of the last century people apparently
preferred privacy, and where we now have open railings
they had walls. There was a wall in front of Peterhouse
and another shut off the little garden near the east end
of Trinity Chapel ; a third wall enclosed the graveyard
of St. Andrew's Church, and another had but recently
hidden the Round Church. The new buildings of the
Pitt Press were opened in 1833 and the old Lodge and
neighbouring buildings which clung round the east end
of King's Chapel had been by this time removed, but
houses still clustered round the east end of St. Edward's
Church and Great St. Mary's, and, indeed, the greater
part of Market Hill was cumbered with buildings. The
market was then held in an L-shaped space along the
east and the southern side, and the old conduit which
now stands at the corner of the Lensfield and Trumping-
ton Roads stood at the west end of the southern limb.
The greater part of the marketing in those days was
done on Peas Hill, at that time a more spacious area
than our present market-place, and Cambridge is one of
the few towns left where the weekly market is still a
feature in the life of the citizens. The year after Newton
came up a providential fire destroyed some of those
houses clustering around the east end of St. Mary's, and
the opportunity was taken to remove the others.

H

98 DR. SHIPLEY'S REMINISCENCES

The heavy gallery which occupied the whole width
and some half of the depth of the chancel of Great St.
Mary's remained almost until Newton became Professor.
Here the Heads of Houses and the Doctors listened to, or
slept through, the University sermon in great state, the
Vice-Chancellor sitting on a throne in the centre of the
front row. The University Library then sheltered on
the west side " the Philosophy School," on the north the
Divinity School, on the south " the School for Civil Law
and Physic," and on the east a room where the Norrisian
and other Professors of Divinity lectured. The Registry
where the Registrary then carried on his business ad-
joined the Divinity School. All these rooms now happily
form part of the Library, the heart of the University.
Gonville and Caius College then presented a more modest
and chastened front to the world than it does now, but
was, about this time, considering plans for the existing
Hall and Combination Room, and towards the end of the
'sixties Waterhouse's buildings were erected, replacing
amongst other things the Theatre Coffee House and the
original business house of the publishing firm of Mac-
millan. All Saints' Church, once known as Allhallows-in-
the-Jewry, stood over against Trinity, with its tower pro-
jecting over the narrow footpath and pierced by the
" side-walk." The Selwyn Divinity Schools and the
Literary Schools did not then exist in St. John's Street,
but on the other side of the road to the Pensionary, which
stood where now they stand, was a curious congeries of
buildings known as the Labyrinth, a relic of the Hospital
founded about 1200 by a burgess of Cambridge, John
Frost. Here in dark and ill-arranged rooms lived a
number of the more evangelical students, Simeonites as
they were then called. These students and their dwel-
lings are vividly described by Samuel Butler in his novel,
f' The Way of All Flesh." The Labyrinth occupied part

MAGDALENE COLLEGE 99

of the area now covered by Scott's Chapel at St. John's.
The old chapel stood till 1869 and the Master's Lodge
then occupied the north end of the Hall and the north
side of the second court. The new Lodge near to Magda-
lene College was only erected in 1863, and in Newton's
student-days a lane known as St. John's Lane ran from
St. John's Street along the north side of the College to
a small hythe which abutted on the river, close to the
west end of the Library of St. John's.

Holy Sepulchre had recently been ' restored ' by
the Cambridge Camden Society, to the despair of all
later archaeologists, and the opportunity was probably
then taken of removing the wall which, as an old print
shows, shielded the Round Church from, the vulgar gaze.
A little way beyond Newton's College stood in his
student-days the old Church of St. Giles. ' It is not
improbable that this is the parent parish of Cambridge,"
writes Mr. T. D. Atkinson. We must never forget that
Cambridge in origin was over the river, although the
only " transpontine " College — as a late Master of Trinity
designated Magdalene — was that to which Newton
belonged. The Church, even after being restored by
the ingenious Professor Farish, retained many features
of interest, and it is a great pity that it was destroyed
when the present plain, one might even say ugly, edifice
was erected in 1875.

The College which Newton joined in 1849 was some-
what different from the Magdalene of to-day. A year
or two before his "coming up," the " Cambridge Guide '
describes the outer of its two courts as ' ' very neatly
stuccoed and sashed — and from the walls having been
lately surmounted by an open parapet the whole presents
an air of great neatness and elegance." ' The chapel is
about 50 feet long, 18 broad ; it is fitted up in an ex-
ceedingly neat and pleasing manner, and has a curious

100 DR. SHIPLEY'S REMINISCENCES

Altar-piece of plaster of Paris representing the two
Marys at the Sepulchre after the Resurrection, in
alto-relievo, by the ingenious Mr. Collins." The words
" neat " and " neatness " were overworked words in the
middle of the last century and probably felt correspond-
ingly tired.

But to return to the chapel ; towards the end of the
seventeenth century the space in the roof had been
floored in to make an upper chamber in which the
College Library was then placed, but about the time of
Newton's arrival at Magdalene this upper story was
removed, and the chapel was heightened, and by adding
to it part of the Master's old Lodge lengthened. These
' lodgings " had occupied the area now covered by the
College Library, with an outer staircase and a northern
wing, both of which disappeared when the present Lodge
to the north of the College was built in 1835.

The restoration of the chapel began in 1847 and lasted
over a period of four or five years. During this time all
the ' incongruities were swept away and the chapel
skilfully and beautifully restored to its original Gothic
character ; the fine, high-pitched timber roof of the
fifteenth century was once more restored to view ; the
entire building fitted up with richly-carved and appro-
priate wood- work ; the east window opened and with
two side windows filled with painted glass." To those
of us who only knew the Professor as a living and teach-
ing zoologist it came as a surprise when we learned that
he had painted one of the figures of these windows. He
himself never alluded to it.

On the southern slope of Magdalene towards the
river is now an open garden, with a parapet and water-
gate — which no one ever seems to use — flanked at the
eastern end by the new buildings of the kitchen and by
a comely set of students' quarters. These last buildings

THE CAM 101

Newton never saw. This garden and the new buildings
occupy a site bought in part from Jesus College in 1790
and in part from the town in the following year. When
Newton came up, and for a quarter of a century after-
wards, this site was covered by a congestion of small
tenements, those abutting on the river-side being for the
most part small ale-houses. In the middle of the last
century much of the food and the wood and reeds used
for firing came into Cambridge ( up the Cam," and
numerous small " hythes " such as we can still see to-day
between the Magdalene Bridge and the northern side of
St. John's College were then conspicuous along the upper
reaches of the Cam, between Magdalene and St. John's
and above Queen's, where the great mills were, and
although for the most part put out of action, still are.
The towing horses of the barges were cast off after
passing Midsummer Common, and then the barges were
punted along the backs of the colleges by stout poles
called " spreads." In those days the bargee was a social
feature in the University, as readers of Thackeray's
' Codlingsby " will recall.

In Mr. T. D. Atkinson's plan of Magdalene the houses
huddled on this narrow site were separated from the
College by a narrow pathway known as Salmon's Lane,
but one of Newton's colleagues has told me that Newton
used to say there were two lanes running parallel with
the river and two rows of tenements between them ;
after all, it is difficult to be incredulous about the over-
crowding of small tenements sixty-five years ago, but
one outstanding fact is that the corner house nearest to
the bridge was a more substantial building and sheltered
a well-known doctor of the town.

Newton came of a country-gentry stock The family
fortune was based on the West Indies, and it suffered
the general decline which accompanied the abolition of

102 DE. SHIPLEY'S REMINISCENCES

slavery. His father was the owner of the Elveden
estate near Thetford, whch was later sold to Prince
Dhuleep Singh and afterwards passed into the possession
of Lord Iveagh. His brothers, as brothers in county
families in those days did, went their several ways into
the various professions. Alfred Newton himself was
destined for the Church ; there was, I believe, a family
living, and I well remember on one sunny August after-
noon in his later years as he and I went together on a
drive over the chalk hills between Cherry Hinton and
the Hills Road, his telling me this, and adding that " the
nearer he got to orders the less he liked the look of
them." Not that he was not always a Christian and a
genuinely religious man, but he had his views, and Newton
when he had his views never varied them or abated one
iota of them. On the whole, I am inclined to think that
it made for peace in the Established Church when Newton
decided not to take holy orders.

When I came up to Cambridge in 1880, a shy under-
graduate, who had spent one year at St. Bartholomew's
Hospital, where with the help of Stephen Paget I had
dissected the leg of the wife of the butler * of the First
Napoleon, I and my contemporaries fell under the
glamour of Morphology. We were not so very far off
from the " Origin of Species," and we were even con-
temporaneous with Darwin's later works, all of which
dealt with living creatures, living organisms, and yet
our obsession was with the dead, with bodies beautifully
preserved and cut into the most refined slices, stained
in various pigments so that like the king's daughter of
the psalmist they were " all glorious within." Professor
Adami, the distinguished pathologist, and I spent our

* He was an old soldier wlio had served in this capacity to Napoleon I.
at Longwood and in his old age had married a young wife, who through
misfortune died in the Hospital, and, uo one claiming the body, it was

dissected.

FRANCIS BALFOUR 103

afternoons during half a term in cutting into thin slices

a small Amphioxus — there was no automatic microscope

then, and each section had to be mounted on a separate

slide — when really we should have been better employed

in rowing or in playing football. It was a curious, and

to me a still unexplained, result of Darwin's teaching

that the younger men who — at a very great distance —

followed his footsteps, followed them not in a direct

line but at an angle, a morphological, an embryological,

and an historical angle, an angle which, to use again an

Americanism, anyway pointed more to the dead than

the living. Professor Francis Balfour was about this

time finishing his epoch-making work on Comparative

Embryology. He was in a way the founder of a new

science, and without doubt was the most attractive man

I have ever met. He had to a peculiar degree that

elusive and indefinable quality, charm, and he charmed

us all. Educated humanity is ever turning this way

and that, trying to explore the unknown, to read the

riddle of our being. It will never be solved, and were it,

what would be left ? In tin early 'eighties comparative

embryology seemed the most likely means of reaching

some solution of this eternal problem, and in a minor

way, under Balfour and his lieutenant Adam Sedgwick,

we all became comparative embryologists.

Newton, however, had but little interest in such
subjects ; not that he opposed them in any way ; indeed,
he promoted them by his personal influence, and by
lending his demonstrator to the acting Head of the
Morphological Laboratory. Although in some respects
old-fashioned and with fixed ideas, he was like Mr.
Crisparkle's mother, "always open to discussion," but
he invariably looked, as the China shepherdess looked,
as though he would like to see the discussion that would
change his mind.

104 DE. SHIPLEY'S REMINISCENCES

Yet he was open to argument, and without professing
to study or to care much about the newer aspects of his
subjects, he invariably helped them forward. It is
characteristic of his liberality of thought that when
some years before his death he nominated a deputy to
give his formal lectures, he chose William Bateson, the
brilliant prophet of Mendelianism, a subject the Professor
was uninterested in and probably mistrusted. He was,
in fact, a mid- Victorian zoologist, very painstaking,
quite unusually accurate, old-fashioned in some ways,
but we must never forget that he was one of the first of
the zoologists of repute to accept and champion the
views of Charles Darwin.

When I was a student his two courses of lectures
were on Darwinism and on the Geographical Distribution
of Animals. I don't think Newton liked lecturing. In
the affairs of ordinary life he did not seem shy, but he
did seem shy about lecturing. To begin with, he chose
the uncomfortable hour of 1 p.m. I once also had to
lecture for two or three years at that unhappy hour,
and meeting at some social function a Girton lady who
came to hear me, I apologised to her for frequently
stopping before 2 p.m. on the ground of hunger. ' Oh,"
she said, " we had always assumed that you'd lunched,"
and she seemed to think her or the other ladies' assump-
tion as satisfactory to me as a mutton chop.

Newton's lectures were desperately dry and very
formal. The Professor sat before a reading desk and
read every word of the discourse from a written manu-
script, written in his minute hand with a broad quill,
so that all the letters looked the same, like the Burmese
script. At long intervals there was drawn the outline
of a tumbler, like the wine-glasses which used to indicate
in the foreign " Bradshaws ' those railway stations
which boasted of the existence of refreshment-rooms.

LECTURES 105

Whenever the Professor came to these outlines he
religiously took a sip of water. Whether it was the
time of day or whether it was that we students were
all absorbed in Comparative Embryology and in Mor-
phology, the attendance was always small. I went
during my second and third year, and at times was the
sole auditor. Not that that made the least difference
to the Professor. He steadily and relentlessly read on
— " the majority of you now present know," ' most of
my audience are well aware," and similar phrases left
me in considerable doubt as to what parts of me were
' the majority " and which the " most."

Where the Professor excelled was in informal talks in
his room after lecture and in his home in the Old Lodge
at Magdalene College. He was a zoologist, not a necrolo-
gist. As far as his lameness had permitted he had always
been an open-air man. Owing to the vastness of the
subject, every student of zoology must have a special,
favourite group of animals, and Newton cared most
about birds. But he was no " mere ornithologist," as
his unsuccessful opponent at the election to the pro-
fessorship described him in 1866. His shilling text-
book ' Zoology," one of the Manuals of Elementary
Science, published by the Society for the Promotion of
Christian Knowledge, was a model of its kind, and
undoubtedly should be better known, for in clear and
clean-cut English it covered practically every branch of
zoology, and to the younger student presented an
ordered framework upon which he could hang his
scattered and isolated, but none the less real, items of
knowledge.

Newton's Sunday evenings were great institutions
in the life of all of us who cared about biological science
thirty odd years ago and onwards till his death. They
began in a small way ; when the Professor first became

106 DR. SHIPLEY'S REMINISCENCES

a Professor in 1866 the number of those who passed the
Natural Science Tripos was but nine, the year Newton
died the numbers were, in Part I. 147, and in Part II. 36.
One of his best friends, one who " came up " about the
time Newton was elected to the Chair of Zoology and
Comparative Anatomy, and who in those remote days
frequented the Sunday evenings at Magdalene College,
told me that when his younger brother came up a few
years later he sent by his hand a brace of partridges.
The freshman knocked at the door, and entering the
room, faced the back of the Professor, and after an
almost audible pause, said " Please, sir, I've brought
you some birds." " Skins or skeletons," flashed back
the ornithologist, always more occupied in ornithology
than in gastronomy. Not that Newton did not value
a good dinner. He breakfasted a little late, but very
heartily, and he rather despised those who ate lunch —
a biscuit and a glass of sherry buoyed him up for his
one o'clock lecture — but he enjoyed his dinner. One
curious custom he had, he always watered his wine ; he
used to request a carafe to be placed near him and
poured a little water into each glass of wine, though if
I recollect aright he spared the port.

On Sunday evenings after a glass, or perhaps two, of
port, and a couple of exiguous Russian cigarettes in the
Combination Room, the Professor used to retire, and
twenty minutes later those who were privileged to dine
with him in Hall went through the garden entrance,
and so into the inner room, where we found him seated
in an arm-chair just within the doors. The room was
plainly but comfortably furnished in the mode of the
Victorian period ; the fire was very hot, the guests were
seated in a large circle of chairs, something like the
Christy Minstrels of our boyish days; and yet in
spite of these obvious disadvantages Newton's Sunday

SUNDAY EVENINGS 107

evenings saved Zoology as the science of living animals
in Cambridge. Often there were awkward pauses, but
the Professor sat through them all, making paper spills
out of old letters, and smoking pipe after pipe. To him
the little Russian cigarettes were merely "hors d'oauvres,"
the real business was tobacco in a pipe, and he held very
strong views about pipe racks. The bowl of the pipe must
be supported so as to be lower than the stem, and the
numerous racks that supported his innumerable pipes
exemplified this principle. These Sunday evenings were
a little formal and a little dull, we were all a little afraid
of the Professor, and much more afraid of ourselves.
Sitting in that semicircle of seats it was difficult if not
impossible to break up into groups, and yet those Sunday
evenings and some others which I attended in Oscar
Browning's rooms at King's and in Vine's at my own
College helped me more than I can say. He was, in the
real and the best sense, a man of the world, and hence
he was able to help us and did help us in many ways,
not in the least zoological.

In politics and in daily life Newton was a Conserva-
tive, even a Tory, he took little part in party affairs,
having more important things to trouble about, but he
resented and opposed any change in " the daily round,
the common task." Alterations in the College dinner,
the introduction of an organ into the chapel, the presence
of ladies at divine service, all met with his disapproval
and his dissent, and neither were silent. For many
years he presided as the first Chairman of the Board of
Biology and Geology constituted under the statutes of
1881. He was a just and equable chairman, better,
indeed, in the chair than out of it, but he never approved
of the existence of the body he presided over, and
nothing would induce him to vote either for or against
so new-fangled an idea as a Doctor of Science. His

108 DR. SHIPLEY'S REMINISCENCES

conservative caution spread at times to his writings.
We have seen that he was able and even willing to accept
new ideas and to teach them, when he had by careful
thought arrived at the conviction that they were sound,
still in his magnum opus, the " Dictionary of Birds," he
preferred an alphabetical arrangement of his material
rather than commit himself to any of the existing
schemes of classification. None of these seemed to him
satisfactory, and of course no system of classification of
natural objects ever can be.

Here may I add a few lines I wrote about Newton
very shortly after his death, when my memory of him,
never to be dulled, was, perhaps, a little sharper than
now ?

The Museum of Zoology in Cambridge, which has
grown to be one of the largest in the kingdom, attained
its position largely under his guidance. He was always
on the look out for new and valuable specimens, con-
stantly, though anonymously, buying and presenting
these. He very greatly disliked any of his donations
to be recorded in the Reports of the Museums and
Lecture Rooms Syndicate. His gifts, not only of speci-
mens, but of books, to the Library of the department
must have cost a very large sum. His interest in old
books and early editions was that of a scholar. He
spent much time and knowledge on the University
Library, but his special province was the Philosophical
Library, situated in the heart of the Museums, over
whose destiny he presided for many years. It is largely
due to him that the Library at the present time takes
in some 600 periodicals, and nothing gave him greater
satisfaction than when, by the careful study of book-
sellers' lists, he was able to complete a " broken set."
There was something peculiarly scholarly about Newton's
writings ; and in small matters of grammar and punctua-
tion he was punctilious in a way that is now becoming
rare. Very little that he published was of an ephemeral

CHARACTER 109

nature, and his printed word is characterised by great
width of knowledge, untiring research, and an unusual
degree of accuracy. In trying to sum up Newton's
character one's ' mind naturally reverts," as Mrs. R.
Wilfer said, to Dickens' description of Sir Leicester
Dedlock, ' ' He is a gentleman of strict conscience, dis-
dainful of all littleness and meanness, and ready at the
shortest notice to die any death you may please to
mention rather than give occasion for the least im-
peachment of his integrity. He is an honourable,
obstinate, truthful, high-spirited . . . man." I have
left out the words " intensely prejudiced, perfectly un-
reasonable," because although at times Newton was
prejudiced and was unreasonable, the adjectives Dickens
used go beyond my estimate -of these traits in his
character.

Once more to quote what I wrote soon after his
death :

When once you were a friend of Newton's, you were
always his friend. He was possessed of the old-fashioned
courtesy of manner, and a certain leisureliness of habit,
which made a visitor feel that he was not trespassing on
the time of his host. Both in appearance and in cha-
racter he had the finest attributes of the old race of
English country gentlemen, to which by birth he
belonged.

CHAPTER VIII

EARLY DAYS OF DARWINISM

IN the early part of 1858 Newton accompanied John
Wolley to Iceland for the purpose of inquiring into the
supposed recent extinction of the Great Auk, and into
the causes which had brought about that result. During
two months of enforced inaction in an Iceland village,
the two men had opportunities of frequently discussing
questions that were then occupying the minds of
biologists. Among these were, " What is a Species ? " and
" How did a Species begin ? ' -the latter a question all
the more naturally arising from the fact that their
particular business was to find out how a species had
come to an end. Both of them were well acquainted
with the views of Lamarck and the author of the ' ' Ves-
tiges of Creation," and also of the contrary views of Sir
Charles Lyell and of Adam Sedgwick. Moreover, in
the preceding year, Newton had visited America, where
he had frequently been impressed with the opinions of
Professor Louis Agassiz, which were, briefly, that each
species had had not one Centre of Creation, but that
many — perhaps most — species had been created in
several places, at sundry times, and possibly in vast
numbers. These various conflicting theories gave rise
to long discussions, often turning on the prevalence of
Blue Foxes in Iceland, the relations between the Red
Grouse and the Willow Grouse, and so forth ; but they
never produced any definite result beyond a firm con-
viction that, for the salvation of Botany and Zoology
there must soon be found a solution of those problems.

no

VARIATIONS IN SPECIES 111

On his way back from Iceland, Newton paid a visit
to his friend H. B. Tristram (at that time rector of
Castle Eden), who had recently made two journeys to
Algeria and Tunis, where he had diligently collected
specimens of birds and reptiles. Among these he was
particularly interested by the desert-forms represented
in the large series of Larks or Chats.

Generally the inhabiters of the desert took a dull
drab, but occasionally a warm or sand-coloured hue,
while those which did not dwell in the desert wore a
suit of much more decided and variegated tint. . . I
was at once reminded of what, in a less degree, I had
been shown and told the year before at Washington by
Professor Baird, who pointed out to me the variations
exhibited by examples of the same species of several
groups of North American birds, according as they came
from woodland, prairie, or elevated country. Among
all these were indications of a similar general law. The
woodland examples were the most highly coloured.
Those from the prairies were less deeply tinted ; while
those from the high plains — districts which, from what
I heard, seemed to approach in some degree the con-
dition of a desert such as is found in the Old World —
exhibited a fainter coloration. Here, then, was a sign
that like causes produced like effects even at the
enormous distances which separated the several localities.
The effects were plainly visible to the eye ; what were
the causes ? The only explanation offered to me by
Professor Baird, so far as I remember, was that the
chemical action of light, uninterrupted by any kind of
shade, produced the effect that was patent. With this
explanation, though it hardly seemed satisfactory, one
was fain to be content.

It is thus apparent that Newton was ready and
anxious for a reasonable explanation of these problems,
and that he embraced the new teaching with enthusiasm

112 EARLY DAYS OF DARWINISM

will be evident from the following letters and extracts
from his writings.

Not many days after my return home there reached
me the part of the Journal of the Linnean Society which
bears on its cover the date 20th August, 1858, and
contains the papers by Mr. Darwin and Mr. Wallace,
which were communicated to that Society at its special
meeting of the first of July preceding, by Sir Charles
Lyell, and Dr. (now Sir Joseph) Hooker. I think I had
been away from home the day this publication arrived,
and I found it when I came back in the evening. At all
events, I know that I sat up late that night to read it ;
and never shall I forget the impression it made upon me.
Herein was contained a perfectly simple solution of all
the difficulties which had been troubling me for months
past. I hardly know whether I at first felt more vexed
at the solution not having occurred to me than pleased
that it had been found at all. However, after reading
these papers more than once, I went to bed satisfied
that a solution had been found. All personal feeling
apart, it came to me like the direct revelation of a higher
power ; and I awoke next morning with the conscious-
ness that there was an end of all the mystery in the
simple phrase, ' Natural Selection." I am free to
confess that in my joy I did not then perceive, and I
cannot say when I did begin to perceive, that though
my especial puzzles were thus explained, dozens, scores,
nay, hundreds of other difficulties lay in the path, which
would require an amount of knowledge, to be derived
from experiment, observation, and close reasoning, of
which I could form no notion, before this key to the
" mystery of mysteries " could be said to be perfected ;•
but I was convinced a vera causa had been found, and that
by its aid one of the greatest secrets of creation was going
to be unlocked. I lost no time in drawing the attention
of some of my friends, with whom I happened to be at
the time in correspondence, to the discovery of Mr.
Darwin and Mr. Wallace ; and I must acknowledge that

EVOLUTION 113

I was somewhat disappointed to find that they did not
so readily as I had hoped approve of the new theory.
In some quarters I failed to attract notice ; in others my
efforts received only a qualified approval. But I am
sure I was not discouraged in consequence ; and I never
doubted for one moment, then nor since, that we had
one of the grandest discoveries of the age — a discovery
all the more grand because it was so simple.*

At once a hundred difficulties were swept away :
there seemed to be a plausible answer to the question,
: What is a Species ? ' The new theory might even
explain how one variety or race might pass into another,
but the doubt arose whether the process of invisible
steps could do more than that and produce the stupen-
dous effects, which are now expressed by the word
Evolution.

That the doubt thus implied was occasionally stagger-
ing I do not deny ; but I always found that, even if for
a time I reeled under it, I could by further reflection
recover my balance and resume my position. The
consideration which thus enabled me to keep, on the
whole, a steady attitude, was one furnished by a very
small amount of mathematics acquired in earlier days
and fortunately yet borne in mind. One has not to go
far in the study of algebra before one meets with a
theorem in which one finds that certain properties can
be proved for certain definite numbers in succession.
If an indefinite number be taken, the same property
can be proved to exist for the number next to it. Hence
mathematicians (those most sceptical of men) conclude
that this theorem is universally true. Now, to apply
this. The existence of variation, however slight that
variation might be, once accepted (and a very moderate
amount of experience showed that variation did exist),
who could doubt that variation might in certain cir-
cumstances go on indefinitely ? Whether it would do
so or not was another matter ; but what naturalist had

* " T should add that at this time I had no acquaintance personally or
by correspondence with either of the discoverers."

I

114 EARLY DAYS OF DARWINISM

ever with good reason attempted to set a limit to
variation ? Until such limitation, or cause for limita-
tion, was shown, I felt I was justified in concluding that
variation might go on indefinitely — that variation might
extend, as indeed there was some positive evidence of
its doing, from coloration to minor points of structure,
and from minor to major points. Thus it seemed to me
that, if mathematicians were right in admitting the truth
of Euler's proof of the Binomial Theorem, I could not
be very wrong in accepting the truth of Evolution by
means of Natural Selection. When afterwards I came
to read Mr. Darwin's ' Animals and Plants under
Domestication," the aptness of my application of the
mathematical reasoning seemed to be more and more
perfect. In those domesticated animals and plants of
which the origin was perfectly certain, we had the definite
quantities required for the illustration : in the domesti-
cated animals and plants of which the origin was not so
certain, we had the indefinite quantities : in the wild
animals and plants the unknown quantities. We could
prove by experiment that such and such results followed
from any next step with regard to our known quantities,
and by experiment could prove that similar results
followed from the next step with regard to our indefinite
quantities. Were we not justified then in concluding
that the like results would follow from our unknown
quantities ? *

* " I had often wondered that this obvious illustration had not occurred
to Mr. Darwin, in none of whose works have I noticed any allusion to it ;
but the cause of the omission I did not suspect until I read his Auto-
biography. It was probably due to the fact of his not having made
sufficient progress in mathematics to become aware of this simple theorem.
He has told us (vol. i. p. 46), ' I attempted mathematics and even went
during the summer of 1828 with a private tutor (a very dull man) to
Barmouth, but I got on very slowly. The work was repugnant to me,
chiefly from my not being able to see any meaning in the early steps in
algebra. This impatience was very foolish and in after years I have
deeply regretted I did not proceed far enough at least to understand some-
thing of the leading principles of mathematics.' He goes on to declare
that he did not believe he ' should ever have succeeded beyond a very low
grade.' To this belief we may perhaps demur. Under good tuition there
seems no reason why he should not have derived as much satisfaction from

DARWIN AND WALLACE 115

Only four days after the publication of the famous
paper, and one day after he had received and read it,
Newton began to apply the principles of the theory of
Darwin and Wallace to particular cases within his own
knowledge.

I have been very much pleased with a paper in the
last number of the Linnean Society's PTOC. on " the
tendency of Species to form Varieties and on the Per-
petuation of Varieties and Species by Natural means of
selection," by Darwin and Wallace. I am not quite
sure that I altogether agree with them, but there is very
much in it that is very good, and most of the ideas pro-
pounded are original. I think there is a hint in it on
which you might speak, on the subject I suggested to
you when at Castle Eden as being a likely one for a
paper before the Linnean Society, the variations induced
by desert climate, as exemplified in North African Larks
and Wheatears. The idea is perhaps not new, i.e. many
naturalists know perfectly well that birds from desert
localities do not exactly resemble individuals of the same
species (i.e. good species, not those of bird-namers) from
more favoured districts. Baird of Washington is quite
familiar with this fact, and has or is about to put it into
print together with the reasons whence he draws his
conclusions. The great Gould, too, has made remarks
(Proc. Z.S., 1855, p. 78) bearing more or less on the same
subject, with respect to the coloration of birds inhabiting
forests and plains, sunny and cloudy atmospheres ; but
I do not suppose any one has connected these facts with
the theory (though it is more than theory) of Darwin and
Wallace, nor has any one practically applied their ideas.
It seems to me that they can be connected and should
be connected thus : any modification of the structure
(using the word in its widest sense, even to comprehend

algebra as he tells us a few pages before (vol. i. p. 33) he did from geometry,
and as much delight as when the principle of the vernier was explained to
him " — Extract from " Early DajTs of Darwinism," Macnrittan's Magazine,
February, 1888.

116 EARLY DAYS OF DARWINISM

a mere change of colour) of an animal must in some way
or other affect the ease or difficulty with which it con-
contrives to maintain its existence. In the struggle for
life which we know to be going on among all species, a
very slight change for the better, such as improved
means of escaping from its natural enemies (which would
be the effect of an alteration in colour from one differing
much to one closely resembling the hue of surrounding
objects), would give that variety a great advantage over
the typical or other forms of the species. Allow the
advantage to be continued for a considerable period,
and the variety becomes not only a race with its varia-
tions still more strongly imprinted upon it, but the typical
form or varieties having experienced changes not ad-
vantageous to their life may even become extinct.
Thus to apply the case, suppose an Algerian desert to
become colonised by a few pairs of Crested Lark ; we
know that the probability is that of them one or two
pairs would be likely to be of a darker complexion than
the others, these and such of their offspring as most
resembled them would become more liable to capture
by their natural enemies, hawks, carnivorous beasts,
etc. ; the lighter coloured ones would enjoy more or
less immunity from such attacks ; let the state of things
continue a few hundred years, the dark-coloured in-
dividuals would be exterminated, the lighter-coloured
remain and inhabit the land.

Again, smaller or shorter-billed varieties would
undergo comparative difficulty in rinding food when
food was not abundant, and had to be picked out from
crevices among stones, these would be in comparatively
reduced condition, in the breeding season they would
not feel their capabilities were such as inclined them to
matrimony, the consequences would be in a few hundred
years the longer-billed varieties would be the most
numerous, they would become a race, in a few hundred
years more they would be the sole possessors of the land,
the shorter-billed fellows dying out of their way until
that race was extinct. Here are only two cases enume-

ORIGIN OF SPECIES 117

rated wliicli might serve to create, as it were, a new
species from an old one, yet they are perfectly natural
ones, and such as I think must occur, have occurred,
and possibly be occurring still. We know so very little
of the causes which, in by far the majority, if not in
nearly all cases, make species rare or common, that
there may be hundreds of others at work, some even more
powerful than these, that go to perpetuate certain forms
in Darwin's words according to natural means of selec-
tion. You may have a mere individual difference in
the organs of digestion, and in this way produce a
Gillaroo Trout with his gizzard-like stomach, out of a
common Salmo fario. But for your paper you must
first consult Darwin and Wallace, and you will under-
stand that nothing that I have advised here is my own,
but theirs, except the application of their theory to
Algerian Larks and Irish trout. You should also get a
little book of Vernon Wollaston's on the " Variation of
Species," published a year or two ago by Van Voorst,
the price of which is 5s. or so.*

Thirty years later, when writing the article for
Macmillaris Magazine, from which the above extracts
have been taken, Newton asked Tristram to lend him
the last quoted letter and recalled the circumstances in
which it had been written — •

With many thanks I return the old letter you have
sent me. The particular one, or more than one, that I
wanted to see must be much earlier. I think you will
find I mentioned the Darwin and Wallace paper to you
as soon as I became acquainted with it, and that was in
August, 1858, just after my return from Iceland, having
taken Castle Eden on my way home. During our stay
in Iceland Wolley and I had been continually discussing
what should be held to constitute a " species ' and
how new ' species ' began. Of course, we came to no

* Letter to H. B. Tristram, August 24, 1858.

118 EARLY DAYS OF DARWINISM

conclusion worth anything. Then when I was with you
you showed me that marvellous collection of Larks and
Chats, including so many ' Desert forms," something
like which (in the way of local variation) poor Baird had
shown me the year before in Washington. I was wholly
bewildered. Towards the end of the month appeared
that part of the Linnean Journal, and behold all to me
became as clear as possible ! Such a revelation never
was before nor will be, I think, again to me. I want to
work all this into a paper I have to do for Macmillan
a propos of Darwin's " Life and Letters " ; but it has to
be done AT ONCE, and therefore please let me have any
letters you can find showing my frame of mind at that
time, or at least before the publication of the " Origin,"
which was not until Nov. (or perhaps Dec.), 1859. To the
best of my belief I took in the whole thing, details apart,
from the first ; but I find I cannot trust my memory,
and the letters would be a great help to me.*

In November, 1859, the ever-celebrated " Origin of
Species " was published. ' Its contents I devoured and
felt happier than ever, for now I began to see that Natural
History possessed an interest far beyond that which it
had entered into my mind to perceive." The various
reviews of the book, most of them unfavourable to
Darwin's views, were read by Newton, but produced
little or no effect on him except to lower his estimate of
the general run of critics. In the following year he was
present at the memorable meeting of the British Associa-
tion at Oxford-

In the Nat. Hist. Section we had another hot Dar-
winian debate. Mr. F. 0. Morris had a paper on the list
to be read " On the Permanence of Species/' but in the
committee we decided it should not be produced (he was
not there himself), Babington treating us to some selec-
tions from it and remarking that it would, of course,

* Letter to H. B. Tristram, February 2, 1888.

BISHOP OF OXFORD AND HUXLEY 119

appear in due course of time in the new series of the
Naturalist.

The ball was opened by a paper containing diluted
Owenism by Dr. Collingwood, followed by a long un-
diluted atheistical rigmarole by a Prof. Draper, a Yankee.
After this a hot discussion took place. Huxley was
called upon by Henslow to state his views at greater
length, and this brought up the Bp. of Oxford, who made
of course, a wonderfully good speech if the facts had been
correct. Referring to what Huxley had said two days
before, about after all its not signifying to him whether
he was descended from a Gorilla or not, the Bp. chaffed
him and asked whether he had a preference for the
descent being on the father's or the mother's side ?
This gave Huxley the opportunity of saying that he
would sooner claim kindred with an Ape than with a
man like the Bp. who made so ill an use of his wonderful
speaking powers to try and burke, by a display of
authority, a free discussion on what was, or what was
not, a matter of truth, and reminded him that on ques-
tions of physical science " authority " had always been
bowled out by investigation, as witness astronomy and
geology.

He then caught hold of the Bp.'s assertions and
showed how contrary they were to facts, and how he
knew nothing about what he had been discoursing on.
A lot of other people afterwards spoke ; Brodie on the
medical view of the thing, which he did very temperately,
declaring that at present it was impossible to say what
was the truth ; Lubbock, a son of Sir John's, who is a
very clever young fellow, who took a decided Darwinian
view, and Admiral FitzRoy, the man who commanded
the Beagle, and who had better have let it alone.

The feeling of the audience was much against the Bp.,
and Simpson, who had been very anti-Darwin, declared
that if that was all that could be said in favour of the old
idea, he was a convert. Not so Tristram, who waxed
exceedingly wrath as the discussion went on, and declared
himself more and more anti-Darwinian. The discussion

t
120 EARLY DAYS OF DARWINISM

was adjourned until the Monday, but it was then thought
by the leaders on both sides that it had better be dropped,
and so the matter rests.

On the Sunday, at the University Church, Temple,
the Master of Rugby, treated his audience to a sermon on
Darwinism, in which he espoused Darwin's ideas fully !
Nothing very particular occurred during the last few
days, and I did a good deal of lionising. Oxford is no
doubt finer than Cambridge, but not to that extent that
her sons make out.*

Tristram had been the first zoologist of any note
who, at the instance of Newton, publicly accepted the
Darwinian views by his paper in the Ibis of October,
1859 ; his re-conversion at Oxford to the old faith,
perhaps inspired by a feeling of loyalty to the Bishop,
was a source of disappointment to Newton, who sought
(unavailingly) to show him the error of his ways.

Elveden,

July 30, 1860.

MY DEAR TRISTRAM,

Much is to be conceded to a man afflicted with
a Chancery suit, and when it is a friend who is so afflicted
one's feelings are those of the deepest compassion. But
compassion and friendship are strained to the utmost by
your assertion that Ph. colchicus and Ph. torquatus are
' generally acknowledged ' to be local varieties. This
assertion I deny in totissimo. You can only quote two
authorities, who do " acknowledge " it. Cuvier I have
not by me. MacGillivray is by no means unobjection-
able, he only like a wise man goes upon what he has seen,
and it is as plain as daylight that when he wrote he had
never seen a torquatus pur sang. But I will generously
come to your assistance and furnish you with another
authority, — Samuel, by Divine Permission, one of the
Quarterly Reviewers, Bp. of Oxford, a member of the
Council of the Z.S.L., and Chancellor of the most noble

* Letter to Edward Newton, July 25, 1860.

to

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DARWINISM 121

Order of the Garter. Read in the last number of that
classical journal the original of the speech spoken to the
British Asses- ' locutus bos," —not this time sapo-
naceous * but downright " savage and tartaiiy." I am
quite converted. I was (I confess it) in a " state of transi-
tion," but Darwino^tZ I might have remained for a whole
geological aeon. The Bishop's speech and article have
caused me by a process of " natural selection " to become
something better. I am developed into pure and un-
mitigated Darwinism.

It is a delightful reflexion, the amount of charity
with which one can regard all one's fellow creatures. I
am no better than the rest of the human race. It is true
I do not kill and eat animals quite so nearly allied to
oneself as do or did the Maoris, Caribs, or Ancient
Britons. But the difference is only in degree. Oysters
I swallow by the dozen, button mushrooms and straw-
berries by the score, and green peas in countless numbers.
It is amazing how digestion is soothed by the placid
thought that one might have easily sprung from another,
and perhaps the elder, branch of the family, been hatched
a turkey and stuffed with truffles by the hand of a chef,
or even been the truffles oneself, instead of devouring the
same in persona.

Serious as I am in all this, I am still more serious
when I say that I wish you would come with me to
Germany. It is never my way to travel expensively, and
I am sure we should have lots to say to one another. I
will start in ten days if you like.

Yours very truly,

ALFRED NEWTON.

To this Tristram replied—

July 31, I860. ... I quite agree with you that you
are not fit to be trusted to go to Germany without a
keeper. In fact, Hanwell is the only fit place for a
Darwinian. How they can answer the Quarterly I
cannot tell except by the argument of noise and sneers

* The reverend Prelate was irreverently nicknamed " Soapy Sam."

122 EARLY DAYS OF DARWINISM

with which they tried to put down S. Oxon. and every one
else who did not subscribe to the infallibility of the God
Darwin and his prophet Huxley. Many sane men have
their monomania. Let us hope yours is only a transitory
one. The more I look into this renovation of Lamarck,
the more I see it is one blind plunge into the gulph of
atheism and the coarsest materialism. You cannot
stop. It is like a Chancery suit.

The result of the Oxford meeting was of the nature
of a drawn battle between the Darwinians and the anti-
Darwinians. In the following year the British Associa-
tion met at Manchester.

Though the ancient beliefs were not much troubled,
it was for the last time that they could be said to prevail ;
and thus I look upon our meeting in Manchester in 1861
as a crisis in the history of biology. All the same, the
ancient beliefs were not allowed to pass wholly un-
challenged ; and one thing is especially to be marked —
they were challenged by one who was no naturalist at all,
by one who was a severe thinker no less than an active
worker ; one who was generally right in his logic, and
never wrong in his instinct ; one who, though a politician,
was invariably an honest man — I mean the late Professor
Fawcett. On this occasion he brought the clearness of
his mental vision to bear upon Mr. Darwin's theory, with
the result that Mr. Darwin's method of investigation was
shown to be strictly in accordance with the rules of
deductive philosophy, and to throw light where all was
dark before.*

The whole account you will see in the Athenaeum.
How that we fought over Darwinism and the Gorilla.
It was, I think, the general impression that the former
subject had gained many more adherents since the last
meeting than any one had thought for. Even Owen is
prepared " to take quite a different view of what are

* A. N., Presidential Address to the Biological Section of the British
Association, Manchester, 1887.

OWEN AND HUXLEY 123

called species from that which was generally held 20
years ago," and he admits that species may have had
their origin in second causes : after which I think there
is nothing worth squabbling about.

About the Gorilla, Owen, I do not think, gained any
glory ; he asserted the old old story, about the Hippo-
campus minor, etc., as if it had never been questioned ;
but it mightily comforted his hearers to know that there
was all that difference between their brains and a
Gorilla's. So also about his faith in Du Chaillu, I cannot
help thinking that he does not believe in him, and only
keeps on because he has never yet confessed himself
wrong about anything.*

The meeting at Cambridge in 1862 witnessed the last
determined resistance of the anti-Darwinians and their
ultimate defeat.

It was a good meeting, all the better for not being too
crowded. There was a grand kick-up again between
Owen and Huxley, the former struggling against facts
with a devotion worthy of a better cause. The latter
now takes it easy and laughs over it all, but Flower and
Rolleston are too savage. No doubt it is very irritating
when Owen will not take the slightest notice of all they
have done and proved, and Owen does it all in such a
happy manner, that he carries almost conviction from
those who know how utterly wrong as to facts he is.

I had meant to have had an "Ibis" dinner, but the last
was the only evening we could have it, and then a lot of
others wanted to dine together, so it ended in establishing
a new " Club for Promoting Common Honesty " and we
had a feed at the " Lion " under the presidency of Huxley,
with Kingsley as vice. Ibises are to be ex-qfficio members !
We had some very good speechifying from both chairmen
and others. This club, I believe, was founded with one
rule only, and that was that any one drinking Sclaters
health was to be expelled (this was Sclater's stipulation

* Letter to Edward Newton, September 25, 1861.

124 EARLY DAYS OF DARWINISM

in his nervous juxta-matrimonial state, and the only con-
dition under which he would allow the dinner to take
place), so that as soon as Sclater left, which he did early, I
proposed his health and every one drank it ; whereby it is
difficult to say whether the association did not thereupon
dissolve itself ! '

Thenceforward Newton never wavered in his alle-
giance to Darwin's views, and very soon (1863) published
in the Proceedings of the Zoological Society an interesting
confirmation and illustration of Darwin's remarks on the
way in which seeds may be dispersed by birds, describing
the case of a partridge which had been found with its
foot firmly imbedded in a lump of hardened earth. When
the ' Animals and Plants under Domestication ' was
published in 1868, he wrote in the Record of Zoological
Literature a detailed and very appreciative notice of it,
dealing more particularly with the Pigeons, which was
acknowledged most cordially by Mr. Darwin.

Down, Beckenham, Kent,
Feb. 9, 1870.

DEAR NEWTON,

I suppose it would be universally held ex-
tremely wrong for a defendant to write to a Judge to
express his satisfaction at a judgment in his favour ; and
yet I am going thus to act. I have just read what you
have said in the Record about my Pigeon chapters, and
it has gratified me beyond measure. I have sometimes
felt a little disappointed that the lab OIK of so many years
seemed to be almost thrown away, for you are the first
man, capable of forming a judgment (excepting partly
Quatrefages) who seems to have thought anything of
this part of my work. The amount of labour, corre-
spondence, and care, which the subject cost me, is more
than you could well suppose. I thought the article in
the Athenceum, written, I have no doubt, by Owen, was
very unjust ; but now I feel amply repaid, and I cordially

* Letter to Edward Nevvlon, October 8, 1862.

THE ZOOLOGICAL RECORD 125

thank you for your sympathy and too warm praise.
What labour you have bestowed on your part of the
Record / I ought to be ashamed to speak of my amount
of work.

I thoroughly enjoyed the Sunday which you and the
others spent here, and I remain, dear Newton,

Yours very sincerely,

CH. DARWIN.

The Record of Zoological Literature (the name was
changed with the seventh volume to the Zoological Record)
was started in 1864 by the late Dr. Albert Giinther, who
edited the first six volumes. Newton was from the
beginning the principal contributor of details of ornitho-
logical literature, and during three years — 1871 to 1873-
he was the editor. The Record was so necessary to
English-speaking zoologists that when it proved a
financial failure as far as the publisher was concerned,
the Zoological Record Association was constituted,
which bore the expenses, until the Zoological Society
took over the publication of the work. Recently it was
united with the " Royal Society's International Cata-
logue," and it still appears annually as a separate volume
of that Catalogue, retaining its own title. Newton was so
much interested in its continuance that he declined to
receive any remuneration for his contributions or for the
three years of his editorship.

In later life, with characteristic broadness of mind, he
appreciated and approved of the principles of Mendelism,
though he never professed to follow it in detail. While
the early stages are easy enough to understand, the later
steps are just the reverse, and I confess I cannot follow
all the steps — nevertheless, I believe in its universal
truth."

One of the most remarkable things about Mendelism
is that it tends to show the essentially identical nature of

126 EARLY DAYS OF DARWINISM

animal and vegetable life. Experiments are much more
easily carried on (and that on a very large scale) with
plants than with animals, and it is from plants that what
are called " Laws " are most easily deduced ; but when
you can make what is really the same experiment on
animals, you find the results are similar. In one form or
another this has now been tried on Rabbits, Mice of
fancy colours, Canary-birds, Pigeons, domestic Fowls,
and some other things, and I am assured that the excep-
tions to the Mendelian principle proving true are exceed-
ingly rare. Bateson and Punnett are trying to find out
whether these rare exceptions may not be the result of
some other ' ' law ' which we don't at present know,
and it seems to me quite possible that they (B. & P.)
will succeed. There are occasional interruptions
observable in plants, and the cause of them is also under
observation.

Years ago, when I first began lecturing on Evolution,
I used to point out that so far as we could judge the
phenomena of Hybridisation were precisely similar in
animals and in plants, so far as could be tested. Some
crosses that were easily made (horse and ass) were abso-
lutely sterile ; others obtained with difficulty, or at least
seldom (bovines) were perfectly fertile ; and so on with
other properties.*

For many years Newton was a regular attendant at
the meetings of the British Association, of which he was
placed on the General Committee in 1860. He was for
some years Chairman of the Close-time Committee and
of the Migration of Birds Committee. At different times
he was Secretary, Vice-President, and President, of the
Section of Zoology and Botany. The practice of some-
times holding the meetings in the Overseas Dominions
was established too late in his lifetime for him to take
advantage of it, and he particularly regretted being unable
to join the party which visited South Africa in 1905.

* Letter to J A. Harvie-Brown, July 25, 1906.

BRITISH ASSOCIATION 127

Would it had all been ten years ago, and then
assuredly I should have been of the party ! But my
travelling days are over. A curious question has occurred

to me : Will the influx of all these British Asses (

) make up for the loss of the vanished Quagga ?

Every one I have met is charmed with the whole
business, though I have heard of one man who got tired
of it. He is a divine and felt bound, I suppose, to take
a gloomy view of things. During his absence his con-
gregation prayed for him earnestly in a combination
from the form to be used at sea and that of the visitation
of the sick, — he is a bad sailor, — and I am told the result
was ludicrous ! *

In 1875 Newton was a member of the Council of the
British Association, and he took, as always, much trouble
in seeking interesting papers for the Biological Section.
Writing to Mrs. Strickland (June 13, 1876) he drew up
the following imaginary programme for the Zoological
Section at the Bristol meeting : —

Your countryman Mr. Alston is going to be Zoological
Secretary to Section D this year, and I am very glad of
it, for he will work it up well. In fact, his activity is so
great that I am able already to send you a list of some
of the proposed papers. // he gets them, we shall have
a crowd.

Zoological Papers.

1 The President's Address. On the Manufacture of Genera

and Species. Eloge of the late Dr. Gray.

2 Mr. F. Buckland. On Fishery Wares and Fishery Weirs,1

illustrated by models of machinery and implements.

The title of this paper, if objected to as belonging rather to
Section A, may be changed at the last moment, the material will
remain the same.

3 Dr. Carpenter. On the Bore of the Bristol Channel in rela-

tion to Deep Sea Soundings carried on by the author
(including the n -f- 1th chapter of an unpublished auto-
biography).

* Letter to Col. H. W. Feilden, C.B., October 31, 1905.

128 EARLY DAYS OF DARWINISM

4 Miss Lydia Becker. On some Unnoticed Points in the

Theory of Sexual Selection as applied to Entozoa.
(5 Prof. Mivart. On Dimorphism in the Common Frog.
\Q Prof. Huxley. On Man as an Automaton.

7 Sir J. Lubbock. On the Inability of Bees to avail themselves

of Bank Holidays.

8 Cardinal Manning. On Certain Fallacies in Our Estimate

of the Intelligence of the Lower Animals.

9 Captain Lawson.* Exhibition of Zoological Specimens col-

lected in New Guinea.
10 Dr. QuacJcenbosh (of Chicago). On the Colorado Beetle.2

2 Living examples of this destructive animal will be ex-
hibited in the adjoining room in charge of the Quarantine
officers of the Port of Bristol.

N.B. — The papers bracketed will be taken together.

Forty years ago, not less than at the present time,
the members of the Association attended feasts and
functions in the various towns they visited. An amusing
incident occurred at the opening of the meeting at
Brighton —

The funniest thing I witnessed was Sclater being taken
for Louis Napoleon the first night and received by the
Mayor, gold chain and all, with " How many seats does
your Imperial Majesty want ? ' His worship, it should
be said, had dined ! Sclater with great presence of
mind presented Tristram as the Emperor, whereon the
Mayor got furious and turned to me with " Who are these
persons ? ' It should be added that we drove up in the
Rowley carriage, rather a swell affair, to the platform
entrance, and young Rowley who had gone on first, when
the carriage stopped, exclaimed, " There they are,"
meaning us ; but the Mayor, etc., thinking " they " could
only mean the illustrious exiles, hurried out to meet us,
and altogether it was exceedingly comical.

In the 'seventies Newton was a regular attendant

* Capt. J. A. Lawson, " Wanderings in New Guinea," 1875. Claimed
to have climbed in a few hours to 25,314 ft. of " Mt. Hercules,"
32,783 ft. He met herds of wild oxen, troops of monkeys, and tigers of
great size.

THE RED LIONS 129

at the dinner of the Red Lions, a Society of which
Dr. T. G. Bonney, F.R.S., writes the following account :-

THE RED LIONS.

The Red Lions are a sort of Society or Club, composed
of members of the British Association. Their object is
convivial, and they may be said to sleep for all but one
evening in the year, when, during the Meeting of the
Association, they assemble for dinner. The arrange-
ments for this are made by two members, called Jackals.
How these are elected (I think they continue in office
unless prevented from coming to a Meeting) ; what body
elect a "new Lion" (who, I think, unless a permanent
official of the Association, goes through a year of pro-
bation— when he is called a cub), I do not know. I do
not remember to have seen any copy of rules and they
may be only traditional, but rules there are. The
Chairman (how elected I do not know) is generally one
of the senior members of the Association, known to be
humorous and ready of speech — like the late Sir F.
Bramwell or Sir J. Evans. He is called the King Lion.
A card is sent by the Jackals to each member (Lion A)
to say that " Bones will be provided at such a place and
hour " * It is understood that each Lion will be as
humorous as in him lies and abstain from anything like
serious talk with his neighbour. After dinner comic
songs are sung, ludicrous speeches delivered, burlesque
lectures or papers given, which are often most amusing.
At York, I remember — in 1881 — the late Roberts Austen
gave a parody of Prof. Tyndall, and his brother Jackal,
Atcheson (afterwards Secretary) also delivered a laugh-
able piece of nonsense. When dinner is announced, the
" Lions " roar approvingly as they go into the room ; and
shake the tails of their coats — supposed to be wagging
their tails. If the dinner is delayed or anything is not
to their liking they growl ; if they approve, they roar and

* A few guests, usually gentlemen from the place of meeting, specially
connected with the Association, are invited.

K

130 EARLY DAYS OF DARWINISM

agitate their coat-tails. They address the Chair as
" Your Majesty." Ordinary applause is not permissible.
Philosophy, ii] short, on that evening, plays the fool, and
often does it very cleverly and wittily.

At the Red Lion dinner held during the Glasgow
meeting in 1876 the Lions' humour took the form of
telegraphic greetings supposed to have been sent to the
Den by various eminent personages.

Telegrams received and read to the Den by the Lion
King, Glasgow, Sept. 11, 1876: —

1.

Champs Elysees,

cet onzieme Septembre.

La France qui a tant souffert sous le drapeau rouge
ne craint pas les Lions de ce couleur. Je les embrasse.
Vive la France ! Vive 1'Association britannique ! !
Vivent la solidarite et la liquidarite des peuples ! ! !

MACMAHON,

Marechal President.
2.

(Forwarded by the kindness of the Editor of the D.T.)

New York Herald Office,

Central Africa.
Latitude and Longitude mixed.

June 25, 1876.
(Received at Alexandria, September 10, 9.50 p.m.)

Ascended twin peaks over 50,000 feet. Named them
Mounts Herald and Telegraph. Set up columns of each
paper on both. Stars and Stripes float on one, Union
Jack on other. Niggers nasty but don't relish rifles.
Shooting first class lately. Quite a store of explosives
left, but whisky giving out, having met missionaries.
Make most of Cameron while you can as I will be back
soon.

H. M. STANLEY.
3.

Varzin den 11 ten, September, 1876.

Mein allergnadigster Herr und Gebieter, der deutsche
Kaiser sendet seinem Koniglichen Bruder herzlichen

TELEGRAMS TO RED LIONS 131

Gruss, und er bittet den Himinel den britischen Verein
vor dem Jesuiten Hackel zu beschiitzen. Darwinismus
soil nicht in Europa existiren. Drei Armee Corps
werden mobilisirt.

BISMARCK.

4.

Rornae, Palatio Vaticano, hora quindecima diei
Festae Sci. Mungonis, Anno trigesimo primo
pontificatus nostri.

Salus et benedictio apostolica Leonibus Rubris.
Rubri olim nosmet, cor nostri jam erubescit. Dormit
Antonellius. Plenitudine infallibilitatis nostri certiorem
facimus fidelem Haeckelium felicitatis sempiternse. Ilium
virum illustrum in gastrseo nostro nominavimus " Eccle-
siae Propugnator," et, Bismarckio nonobstante, com-
mendavimus eum Collegio Sacrosanct o in loco nostro.
Non sunt approbata a sede apostolica Mivartii dogmata-
Motu proprio.

Pius, P.P.

(No Latin dictionary or grammar being found in the
Den, the foregoing message was unintelligible to the
assembled Lions, but the King announced that he had
had it repeated to Professor Jebb, and the following was
soon after read as the answer received from that eminent
scholar.)

Translation.

Palace of the Vatican, Rome, 15 o'clock. Feast
of Saint Mungo, in the XXXIst year of our
Pontificate.

Health and Apostolic benediction to the Red Lions.
Once Red Ourselves, Our heart still warms to the colour.
Antonelli is at his siesta. Empowered by Our Infalli-
bility we assure the faithful Haeckel of eternal felicity.
Henceforth in our bosom we name him " Champion of
the Church," and notwithstanding Bismarck commend
him to the Sacred College as Our successor. The doc-
trines of Mivart are not yet approved by the Holy See.
Our bowels are rather better.

Pius.

132 EARLY DAYS OF DARWINISM

5.

August 17, 1876,
Lat- 90° N. common meridian.

(Received at Disco Sept. 9. Sent out at 3.43 p.m. by
express Kajack. Forwarded by command of the
Secretary of the Admiralty.)

North Pole reached this morning. Not so high as
St. Rollox's. Scotchman at a good salary found in
charge, as expected. His name is Thomson. Bears
becoming troublesome, buns being exhausted. Weather
sultry. Refrigerators have proved most useful. Start
South to-morrow, meridian of route as yet undecided.

G. S. NARES, Capt., R.N.
H.M.S. Alert.

6.

Executive Mansion, Washington,
Sept. 11, 1876.

American eagle now waving centennial wings greets
Red Lion. How many of our scientists will we extradit
in swap for Huxley, who is having quite a nice time on
this side and concludes to stop ? Would M'Kendrick
like Sitting Bull for vivisection ? Wire reply.

U. S. GRANT.

7.

Oneida Creek,
Sept. 10, 1876.

Marsh's Brontotherium too much for me. Have
come here to regenerate. Very comfortable. Don't
know when I shall return. An opening for Carpenter
as Noyes is effete. Hepworth not thought much of by
sisterhood.

T. H. HUXLEY.

8.

Board of Foreign Relations, Pekin, llth day of
Moon Hien Fung (Month of Universal Abund-
ance, i.e. Harvest Moon) Year of Confusion,
4065.

Blother of Sun and Moon chinchin Led Lion King.
Blitish Ass pigeon game not understand. Too muchee
plenty talkee-talkee not enough washee-washee. Nares

PROFESSORSHIP OF ZOOLOGY 133

big fool go North Pole, muchee ice, starvee-starvee.
Thomson wise man go home chow-chow quack-quack
and bow-bow with Led Lions. Glosvenor pigeon no go.
Ahsin too inuchee savvy. Lice clop vely fine.

Li.*

Towards the end of 1865 it was decided by the Uni-
versity of Cambridge that the teaching of Comparative
Anatomy, which had hitherto been a part of the duty of
the Professor of Anatomy, should be removed from his
school and that a Professorship of Zoology and Compara-
tive Anatomy should be founded. The election took
place on March 1, 1866, and there were two candi-
dates, W. H. D. Drosier, M.D., of Caius, and Alfred
Newton, M.A., of Magdalene. Drosier had been twenty-
second Wrangler in 1839 and a Senior Fellow of his
College. He was a great sportsman, and is described as
' a man of much ingenuity and wide knowledge of
anatomy and natural history." He was, moreover, a
man of considerable property, and was very popular in
the University. Newton was armed with a powerful
array of testimonials from Owen, Gould, Gray, Murchison,
Sclater, and others. It was the bad custom in those days
for elections to be made by the Senate, and candidates
were required to canvass for votes, as in a parliamentary
election. It often happened that electors gave their vote
to a friend, although they might know that he was not
the best candidate for the post.

Magd. Coll.,

March 1, 1866.

MY DEAR TRISTRAM,

I doubt if it had been Horace's luck to stand
a contested election. It would be difficult for any one
then to keep the aequam mentem, and I admit / can't.

* The authorship of these " telegrams " is not certain. They were
found among Newton's papers, written in his own handwriting, so it is
probable that some of them, at all events, were written by him.

134 EARLY DAYS OF DARWINISM

Things, however, are looking somewhat brighter. Except
Humphry, the Professor (elect) of Anatomy, I have all the
medicos in the place actively against me. They consider
that it is profanity for a layman to be a dealer in bones.
We look forward to seeing Clayton's white teeth grinning
hideously to-morrow, and it is too probable that he will
bring up a curate of his who has a vote. ... I have been
interrupted in this by a committee meeting, and my head
is full of nothing but pairs, shufflers, and the like. The
results we have come to are these —

D., 86 good +8 probable = 94

A. N., 101 good+16 possible (shufflers) =117
Absent or not voting . . . . . . 52

Remains of doubtful . . . . . . 16

Total Constituency . . . . . . 279

I would willingly exchange my 16 possibles for D.'s
8 probables.

By this time to-morrow I shall be a man or a mouse.

Yours ever,

ALFRED NEWTON.

March 1, 1866

Close of Poll :—

A. N. 110— D. 82.
Laus Deo !

On the same day Charles Kingsley, whose voting on
this occasion had been directed by his heart rather than
by his head, wrote —

March 1, 1866.

MY DEAR NEWTON,

Now that all is over, I must sincerely con-
gratulate you, though I would not have you (you will
understand why) tell my poor dear old friend Drosier
that I have done so.

You have fairly deserved this post, in the only true
sense of desert, earning, and thereby meriting, and I
know you well enough to be as sure as those who sup-
ported you, that it will be the opening of a career

ELECTED PROFESSOR 135

honourable to yourself and to the University. The way
in which you took my voting against you I shall always
consider as a personal obligation to myself.

Believe me,

Ever yours faithfully,

C. KlNGSLEY.

CHAPTER IX

PROTECTION OF BIRDS

NEWTON had only been Professor at Cambridge for two
years when he made his first appearance on a more public
platform. As Vice-President of the Section of Zoology
and Botany, at the British Association meeting held at
Norwichin 1868, he read a paper entitled, "The Zoological
Aspect of Game Laws," in which he clearly showed that
the wholesale slaughter of many of our birds during the
breeding season would shortly result in their extinction,
unless laws were passed to give them protection. He
began by condemning the exaggerated and over-coloured
statements of those well-intentioned persons who write
to the newspapers on the subject of " bird murder," and
argued that " with some rare exceptions our wild animals
have no great reason to be grateful to their ordinary
defenders in the newspapers." Though some mischief
was undoubtedly done by enthusiastic letter-writers, he
admitted that attention had been drawn to the question,
and that there was a growing desire on the part of the
public to see effectual protection extended to many of
our wild animals.

By far the most complete protection is that afforded
by public opinion. Of this we have the strongest possible
instance in the case of the Fox, in most parts of these
islands. Not much more than a century ago the British
farmer was only induced to permit the galloping of horse
and hounds across his seeds, or winter corn, by the
thought that they were doing him a great service by
ridding him. of a pestilent marauder, and he would hear

136

PROTECTION OF BIRDS 137

with grim satisfaction that the scourge of his wife's hen-
roost had been run into ; or he would willingly at a
vestry meeting pass the churchwardens' accounts giving
rewards for the destruction of a vixen with her cubs,
among other so-called ' vermin." Nowadays, as we
know, the British farmer is generally in the " first flight '
of the horsemen, and the Fox has no friend more staunch.
Thus it will be seen that an entire change of feeling has
been wrought with respect to this species, and a change
of the most effectual kind."

After discussing the causes of the extinction in this
country of the Bustard and the Large Copper Butterfly,
and mentioning the beneficial results of legislation with
regard to Salmon, he pleaded for an effectual measure of
protection of Birds of Prey and Sea-fowl. With regard
to the former he convinced his audience that the decrease
of Hawks has nothing to do with the abundance of game,
and that the presence of Owls is absolutely beneficial.

Now for Sea-fowl — and here I must plead guilty to
the charge (if it be a charge) of being open to a little bit
of sentiment. At the present time I believe there is no
class of animals so cruelly persecuted as the sea-fowl
which throng to certain portions of our coast in the
breeding season. At other times of the year they can
take good care of themselves, as every gunner on the
coast knows ; but in the breeding season, in fulfilment
of the high command to " increase and multiply " they
cast off their suspicions and wary habits and come to our
shores. No one that I have ever heard of has complained
of them as injurious in any way. Some few, as the
' Scoulton Peewits," settle far inland, and their useful-
ness as they follow the plough is everywhere recognised.
But of the rest — I never heard the Willocks or Kittiwakes
of the Yorkshire coast accused of raising the price of
herrings, sprats, and oysters ! I think we may fairly
assume that they are innocuous in every respect. But
how do we treat them ? Excursion trains run to convey

138 PROTECTION OF BIRDS

the so-called " sportsmen " of London and Lancashire to
the Isle of Wight and Flamborough Head, where one of
the amusements held out is the shooting of these harmless
birds. But it is not merely the bird that is shot that
perishes — difficult as it is to say where cruelty begins or
ends — that alone would not be cruelty in my opinion.
The bird that is shot is a parent — it has its young at
home waiting for the food it is bringing far away from
the Dogger Bank or the Chops of the Channel— we take
advantage of its most sacred instincts to waylay it, and
in depriving the parent of life, we doom the helpless
offspring to the most miserable of deaths, that by
hunger. If this is not cruelty, what is ? Can men
blaze away hour after hour at these wretched inoffensive
birds and call it ' ' Sport ' without being morally the
worse for it ? We thank God that we are not as Spaniards
are, who gloat over the brutalities of a bull-fight. Why,
here in dozens of places around our own coasts, we have
annually an amount of agony inflicted on thousands of
our fellow-creatures, to which the torture of a dozen
horses and bulls in a ring are as nothing. Surely I may
be pardoned if I indulge in a bit of sentiment here ? I
began by deprecating over-coloured statements, or I
might dwell on this ghastly picture much longer, but
there is one painful feature which it is said has been
lately superadded. The modern fashion of ladies wear-
ing plumes in their hats is said to give an impetus to the
slaughter. This rests on good authority. Mr. Cordeaux
writes of the Kittiwake at Flamborough (Zoologist,
p. 1009) : ' This graceful and trustful bird is threatened
with speedy extinction at this famous breeding-place ;
thousands have been shot in the last two years to supply
the ' plume trade.' The London and provincial dealers
now give one shilling per head for every White Gull
forwarded ; and the slaughter of these poor birds during
the season (the breeding season, remember) affords
almost constant and profitable employment to three or
four guns. One man, a recent arrival at Flamborough,
boasted to me that he had in one year killed, with his

SLAUGHTER OF SEA-FOWL 139

own gun, four thousand of these gulls ; and I was told
that another of these sea-fowl shooters had an order from a
London house for ten thousand." No wonder the Kitti-
wakes are rapidly disappearing. There has this year been
a marked diminution of the great breeding colony in the
Speeton Cliffs. Fair and innocent as the snowy plumes
may appear in a lady's hat, I must tell the wearer the truth
— " She bears the murderer's brand on her forehead."

Now that a stop should be put to this wanton and
atrocious destruction of a species, aggravated as it is by
circumstances of peculiar cruelty, I think none of my
audience will deny. The only question is how it should
be done. As I have said before, no doubt public opinion
would be the most effectual check ; but on the other
hand, I fear lest by the time we can hope to influence
public opinion to such a degree that Laricide shall be
regarded in the same light as Vulpicide, there will be no
more Kittiwakes on our coast to protect. It seems to
me, after due reflection, that legislative interference is
absolutely required, for we can hope to excite the interest
of Parliament in the matter sooner than we can that of
the nation at large. And this brings me to the special
object of this paper. In many countries, as you are
aware, there is a " close time " proclaimed by the local
authorities, during which time the mere act of carrying
a gun is an offence against the law. I need scarcely say
that this " close time " extends over the breeding season.

After a brief description of the " close time " orders
in force in certain foreign countries and British colonies,
he concluded his paper by an expression of hope that a
" close time " would soon be established in this country.
Although there had been discussions about the destruc-
tion of birds at the meeting of the British Association in
the previous year at Dundee, the meeting at Norwich
was the first occasion on which the question of " close
time " by legislation had been publicly advocated by
a responsible person. Newton's paper was widely

140 PKOTECTION OF BIRDS

commented on by the journals at the time, and it made
a profound impression on the public mind. In the
following year (1869) the Sea Birds' Protection Bill was
passed by Parliament. Thus it may be said that
Newton's paper at Norwich was the first stone in the
foundation of the many Wild Birds' Protection Acts
which have subsequently been passed.

Shortly afterwards the British Association appointed
a Committee ' for the purpose of investigating the
desirability of establishing ' a close time ' for the pre-
servation of indigenous animals." This Committee, of
which Newton was a member and over which he presided
for many years, took an active part in promoting the
earlier Bills for the protection of birds, and the members,
of whom the most prominent were H. B. Tristram,
J. E. Harting, and Newton, were frequently called upon
to give evidence and advice to the Committees of the
House of Commons. In 1872 a bill for the protection of
" Wild-fowl ' was brought into Parliament at the in-
stance of the Close-time Committee, and so many un-
toward changes and chances befell it before it became an
Act that Newton wrote of it —

' Save me from my foolish friends " ought to be a
stave in the spring-song of each fowl of the air from the
Nightingale which warbleth in darkness to the Dotterel
which basketh at noonday. The Bill, as at first proposed,
was framed entirely on the Sea-birds' Preservation Act,
which became law in 1869 and had already proved to be
a successful measure. The great feature of it wras its
being directed to a definite point — the preservation
during the breeding season of those birds which, beyond
all others, were subjected to cruel persecution at that
time of year — thousands of Wild Ducks, Plovers, and
Snipes, being constantly to be found in the poulterers'
shops throughout the spring months, not only killed
while they are breeding, but killed, it is not too much to

CLOSE-TIME COMMITTEE 141

say, because they are breeding, since during that season
they put off much of their natural shyness and fall easy
victims to the professional gunners. Furthermore, all
who really know anything of birds know that it is just
those kinds which are rapidly diminishing in number-
some of them, which in bygone days were most abundant,
are now only seen as stray visitors. There is, for example,
the Avocet, the disappearance of which can be plainly
traced to its destruction by gunners.

There can be no doubt that in its original form the
Bill, as suggested by the Close-time Committee was a
practicable scheme, and which would have gone far
towards the protection of British wild-fowl. Unfor-
tunately, in an almost deserted House, Mr. Auberon
Herbert, on the motion for going into Committee, suc-
ceeded in carrying by a majority of 20 to 15, an " instruc-
tion ' ' to extend the protection accorded under the Bill
to " Wild-fowl " to other wild birds, and thereupon the
spirit of the Bill was entirely changed, and it was con-
verted from the reasonable measure originally contem-
plated into one of indefinite and general scope. It was
at once evident that in its new shape it would be im-
practicable, and notice was speedily given for its rejection.
Finally, it was referred to a Select Committee, by whom
its sweeping clauses were limited by the introduction of
schedules of certain birds to be protected, while the
penalties were diminished. No ornithologist whose
opinion could carry the slightest weight appears to have
been consulted, and no ornithologist was among the
twenty-three members forming the Select Committee.

Mr. Herbert, on the 21st of June last, laid a cuckoo's
egg in the carefully-built nest of the British Association
Committee, and the produce is a useless monster — the
wonder alike of the learned and the layman, and an awful
warning as an example of amateur legislation.*

* Letter to Edward Newton, July 10, 1872.

142 PROTECTION OF BIRDS

I ain in a state of great uncertainty as to the Bill, and
am as often as not inclined to hope it may fail to pass.

The inclusion of the Owl is no doubt a gain in itself,
but considering the cost of it I question it being worth
the price. Owls are and were in no danger of extermina-
tion, but gamekeepers' backs will be put up by the Bill
if it passes, and they will make a point of killing them
now with all the vigour possible. It would have been
better to have let public opinion gradually come round
as it was coming round as to the utility of these and other
birds. All the rest of the additions, saving perhaps the
Kingfisher and Bearded Titmouse, are utterly useless, for
none of them are in any danger of extermination, as are
the ' : Wild-fowl ' pure and simple. The penalty with
costs would have been so plainly inordinate for killing a
Robin Redbreast or a Hedge Sparrow that they were
compelled to reduce it to one-fourth the limit (5s. instead
of £1) and make it include costs. It will now be scarcely
worth any one's while to put the Act in force, and in the
case of many Wild-fowl the gunner will get more for his
bird than will repay him for all trouble and expense, even
if prosecuted and convicted. All this we owe to the fools
of enthusiasts. The Wild-Fowl Bill, followed next year
by one for the regulation of birdcatchers would have done

far more good.*

•>

In spite of the protests of Newton and other members
of the Close-time Committee, the Bill became law, and so
far as the Wild-fowl, which it was primarily designed to
protect, were concerned, it remained to all intents and
purposes a dead letter.

The penalties, which were not at all out of proportion
to the marketable value of Wild-fowl out of season by a
professed gunner, were reduced to meet the case of a
child who might thoughtlessly throw a stone at a Robin,
and indeed, for the first offence no penalty was to be
inflicted — but the culprit only cautioned and dimissed

* Letter to H. B. Tristram, July 29, 1872.

WILD BIRDS' PROTECTION ACT 143

on payment of costs. The Act therefore has been per-
fectly useless — as the real friends of bird protection fore-
saw it would — in regard to Wild-fowl, and their persecu-
tion goes on as actively as ever. For the last two years
the shops have been full of Plovers, Snipes, Wild Ducks,
etc., long after the breeding season, i.e. the so-called
" Close-time," began, just as though no Act existed. I
need scarcely point out to you that no birds are decreasing
more rapidly in this country than Wild-fowl of all kinds,
and this is quite as much owing to the way in which they
are shot down during the breeding season, when they
become comparatively tame, as to drainage and improved
cultivation.*

The most important of the Wild Birds' Protection
Acts was that of 1880, which definitely established the
principle of a close time for all wild birds between
March 1 and August 1, with the imposition of a penalty
for any infringement of that regulation, and a more con-
siderable penalty in the case of certain birds, which were
specially named in the schedule. Unfortunately the
members of the Houses of Parliament did not always
agree as to what birds should be included in the schedule
with the members of the ' Close-time ' Committee,
who had been chiefly instrumental in promoting the Bill.
One of the disputed birds was the Skua, which was not
considered by the Lords to be worthy of special protec-
tion ; it may be said that both species were eventually
included in the schedule.

July 26, 1880.

DEAR WALSINGHAM,

I am very sorry that the Duke of Argyll should
object to any protection being accorded to Skuas. They
are, of course, predatory, but I utterly deny their being
" mischievous and destructive." We have two species
which breed in Britain ; the commoner and smaller

* A.N. to Lord Walsingham, January 27, 1875.

144 PEOTECTION OF BIRDS

species in Pennant's time bred in many of the Hebrides,
Islay, Jura and Rum. It has been for some years quite
extinct in Jura, and the last met in Rum that I have
any record of was in 1837. There are still stations on
both the Uists, Lewis, and some others of the Hebrides.
A few pairs breed in parts of Sutherland and Caithness,
and again in Orkney and Shetland ; but nowhere is the
species sufficiently abundant to do any real harm, while
the decrease within the past century of its breeding
quarters shows that it is a species which will soon dis-
appear, if subjected to the same conditions as formerly.
Its extirpation as a British species would be a positive
loss, not only to our Fauna, but it so happens that to a
scientific zoologist it is one of the most interesting species
we have, because it is, I believe, the only one of our
birds which commonly exhibits " dimorphism ' in its
plumage, and ornithologists have been at their wits' end
to explain the why and the wherefore of this peculiarity.
They would lament its extinction as a very great loss.

Of the other species, the Great Skua, much more is
to be said. I believe it now breeds only on the most
northern of the Shetland Islands, and that it does so is
due to the influence of three successive generations of
the Edmunston family. Their conduct in this respect
has been for upwards of 50 years held up to, and by,
ornithologists as a most laudable example, and in my
opinion nothing could be more detrimental to the hopes
of those who desire to preserve to posterity our more
interesting birds than the striking of this bird's name out
of the schedule. I have been always looking forward to
a fitting opportunity when I could get the Zoological
Society to award its silver medal to the head of the
Edmunston family as an acknowledgment of their
meritorious conduct in keeping this species a living
member of the British Fauna ; for without them it would
long since have " gone under." But I will admit that
the Edmunston family may have (in the beginning) pre-
served this bird from motives of personal advantage ;
still their feelings are shared by others who inhabit the

THE SKUA 145

same island, and I enclose an extract from a paper
written many years since, to show what are the feelings
of the people of Shetland on the subject. That this
feeling exists now I have the testimony of Mr. Howard
Saunders who was in Unst last summer, and to allow
the Great Skua to be exterminated there would in these
days be an outrage.

Yours very truly,

ALFRED NEWTON.

Extract from Mr. R. Drosier's " Account of an
Ornithological Visit to Shetland and Orkney," Magazine
of Nat. Hist., vol. iii. p. 322 : —

The Skua Gull, called by the natives " Bonxie," is
held and cherished by them with the greatest veneration
and kindness, and nothing hurts their feelings more than
to see the death of their favourite bird. I was particu-
larly requested by two or three elderly natives, to spare
this bird : as to the Skua were almost entirely trusted
the care and protection of their lambs, during the summer
months, that are always allowed to wander unrestrained
over the island. These birds possess an inveterate dislike
against the Eagle and Raven ; for no sooner does the
broad and rounded wing of the Eagle appear emerging
from his rocky habitation amid the cliffs, than the Skua
descends upon him from the tops of the mountains, in
bodies of 3 or 4, and never fail to force the eagle to a
precipitate retreat. The natives always reward this
service by casting from their boats the refuse portion of
the fresh-caught fish, which he seizes with greedy
avidity, snatching it almost from the hands of the
fishermen.

There was a strongly supported amendment, which
was eventually dropped, to make bird's-nesting an offence
under the Act of 1880. About this Newton wrote to
Lord Walsingham (July 18, 1880) :—

I do hope you will resist any attempt made by

L

146 PROTECTION OF BIRDS

sentimental people to make egg-taking an offence. If
it were so there would be endless trouble — parents
wouldn't pay the fines for their children, and the gaols
would be full of boys.

Though the " sentimental people ' ' did not succeed
in their endeavours, the poulterers were more persistent,
and in 1881 an amending Act greatly facilitated the
importation of game and wild-fowl killed abroad.

The question of protecting birds' eggs was several
times seriously considered by the Close-time Committee,
and after that Committee ceased to exist the British
Association appointed a Committee in 1891 and 1892
" to consider proposals for the legislative Protection of
Wild Birds' Eggs." In 1893 a Bill was introduced into
Parliament by Sir Herbert Maxwell, Bart., the aim of
which was to enable County Councils to prohibit the
taking of the eggs of such species of birds as it might
seem desirable to name in different localities. The Bill
passed the House of Commons, then it was amended in
the House of Lords, chiefly at the instance of Lord
Walsingham, prompted by Newton, then it was recon-
structed by the Standing Committee and finally dropped
because in its altered form it was not acceptable to its
original promoter.

After its introduction notes on the Bill were written
by Newton and privately circulated among members of
both Houses. These notes * so clearly define his views
on the important question of egg-collecting that no
apology is needed for repeating extracts from them
here.

It undoubtedly appears that it might be advisable to
some extent to give effect to the desire expressed by many
people, that some restrictions of what, for brevity's sake,

* Afterwards published in " Tbe Annals of Scottish Natural History,"
April, 1894.

EGG-COLLECTING 147

may be called ' egging," should be enacted. The
question then arises of what nature these restrictions
should be. It seems very simple to those who have not
fully considered it ; but those who have seriously reflected
upon it find it beset by many complications, and very
difficult of solution. Most people, however, will admit
that birds' eggs are much more exposed to depredation
in certain places than in others, and this only at certain
times.

Proof of this, if wanted, is supplied by the fact that
in several parts of England private persons have formed
small local associations to pay watchers, during a few
weeks in the breeding time, for the protection of the
birds frequenting particular localities — such as the Fame
Islands, the sandhills near Wells in Norfolk, Breydon
Water between Norfolk and Suffolk — which I mention
because I myself subscribe to them. It may be that
there are others.

To me one way of treating the question seems pre-
ferable to any other that has been suggested, and, indeed,
after many years' consideration the only one practicable.
This is to give the local authority (County Council or
Justices in Quarter Sessions), subject to the assent of a
central authority, power to prohibit all egging in certain
definite places for a certain definite time. Such prohibi-
tion would probably be confined to comparatively small
bounds — an island, a sea-beach, cliffs, or sandhills
adjoining the shore, a heath, common, wood or forest, a
public park, a mere or broad with the surrounding land,
or so on, and would be locally known, so that the risk
of boys being sent to gaol would be greatly lessened.
Moreover, all egging being prohibited within the pre-
scribed limits during the inhibited period there would be
no need of attempting to prove that an egg found in the
captor's possession was that of a protected species, such
proof being in many, if not in most cases, as every
practical ornithologist knows, absolutely impossible, if
the defendant were advised by an ingenious counsel ;
for, in the greater number of cases, an egg could not be

148 PROTECTION OF BIRDS

proved to be that of any particular kind of bird, unless a
witness could swear that he saw the bird lay it.

Egging may be considered to be carried on chiefly
by three classes of persons : — •

First, there is the man who for years has gathered the
eggs of Plovers and certain marsh- or sea-birds for edible
purposes, whereby, if he be an adept, he is able by their
sale in the open market to add considerably to his own
livelihood. This man, I believe, would rejoice at a
' close-time ' ' being enforced, after the first, second, or
third laying of the birds, for the places where he plies his
calling, so as to allow the hatching of the second, third,
or fourth laying (as the case may be) — and most of the
birds with which he is concerned lay twice, thrice, or four
times in the season — and so ensure the unimpaired
continuation of the breed.

Secondly, there is the ordinary schoolboy, whose
depredations are at times extremely annoying to the
owners or occupiers of gardens, plantations, and the
like, but declared by the " Close-time " Committee to
have little or no effect in reducing the number of birds
in general, though their continuance year after year in
particular districts may locally produce that effect. Now
it is to be remarked that the ordinary ^schoolboy^as a
rule, is quite indifferent as to the kind of bird whose nest
he may rob, and any restriction as to protected or unpro-
tected species would be wholly lost upon him. To this
rule there are some exceptions, and the exceptions often
grow up to be fair naturalists.

Thirdly, there is the " collector," who is only some-
times a naturalist in the true sense of the word. When
he is one, he may be safely trusted to do no harm ; but
more often he is a dealer, and his influence on the whole
is destructive to the less common kinds of birds, though
even to this there are exceptions — as for instance the
notable case of the Golden Eagle, which in Scotland
would have become extinct, as the Sea Eagle has, were
it not that the price the " collector " pays for its eggs
ensures its preservation at the hands of shepherds,

EGG-COLLECTING 149

foresters, and gillies— but these exceptions are not
numerous, and it cannot be doubted that the dealing
' collector " is in these days an evil, so that no true
naturalist could object to see obstacles put in his way.
Whether he would not be astute enough to escape the
meshes of any Act of Parliament could only be ascertained
after trial ; but certainly an Act to check his proceedings
must be very different from the present Bill, which, I feel
sure, would hardly touch him. He is well enough off: to
employ counsel if charged, and of his own knowledge
would be able to indicate a line of defence that would
ensure his acquittal perhaps in nineteen cases out of
twenty, whatever might be the evidence of the pro-
secution.

On the other hand, the ordinary schoolboy could not
afford counsel ; and, being ignorant of the mode of
escape, would be almost invariably convicted. If the
Bench before whom he was brought let him off with a
reprimand and a nominal penalty, a few cases of the kind
would render the Act ridiculous. If the Bench inflicted
a serious fine, and in default of payment, as would
commonly happen, he went to gaol, the country would
very properly ring with an outcry against an Act which
brought that fate upon him for doing what an ancient
authority— still respected by some people — held to be
irreprehensible (see Deuteronomy xxii. 6, 7).

But, as already hinted, there are places in which the
schoolboy may do real harm, and I see no injustice in
limiting him to some extent, while the ' ' collector ' ' is
generally baneful ; and, as I have tried to show, the man
who gathers eggs to eke out a living would be content, if
not pleased, with restrictions that would tend to multiply
the birds which produce them — just as professional
gunners now admit that, since the passing (in 1876) of
the Wild-Fowl Preservation Act, there are more Wild-
fowl to shoot. I therefore strongly urge that the present
Bill be amended so as to enable places and not species
to be protected. It is an historical fact that old laws,
which certainly did not err on the side of leniency,

150 PEOTECTION OF BIRDS

prohibiting the taking of the eggs of the Bustard, Crane,
Spoonbill, and Wild Goose, have not saved those species
from extirpation in England, and a naturalist may well
doubt whether any law of that kind would have a bene-
ficial effect on any species whose numbers are now
dwindling ; but no one can doubt that if certain localities,
judiciously chosen, were reserved as breeding places by
inhibiting in them for a longer or shorter time, as may
seem advisable, the molestation of all birds frequenting
them, a considerable number of species, the numbers of
which are surely decreasing, would thereby take benefit,
and this with proper precautions, without much risk of
mischief, which I believe the Bill in its present shape will
inevitably produce.

Some of Newton's proposals for altering the Bill of
1893 are more fully stated in the following letter : —

May 28, 1893.

MY DEAR WALSINGHAM,

I thank you for your letter of yesterday. I am
confident that my proposal for places of refuge will be
found practical. Take for instance the Wells " meals '
or sand-hills (mentioned in my" Notes "), where we are
at present put to some expense in protecting Terns' eggs,
and only succeed in doing so through the constant
supervision of Feilden. Here the " order " might define
the inhibited place as beginning, say, half a mile, or one
mile, from Wells Church, and then extending for two
miles along the coast, and 500 (?) yards inland from high-
water mark. Within that area all egging should be pro-
hibited, say, from the 1st or 15th day of May (so as to
leave time for the proper gathering of Plovers' eggs) to
the 1st July in each year. The same could be done with
any of the Broads ; take Hickling for instance, including
Heigham Sound, almost the only breeding place of the
Bearded Titmouse and Ruff that is left. There the limit
might be 500 yards from the water's edge. Notice-
boards, or placards warning people of the inhibited area

PROTECTION OF AREAS 151

and period, should be stuck up at the boundaries, as
many as may be wanted.

I don't at all want to see these preserved places
made too numerous ; and, though I have little faith in
County Councils, I believe they would not care to act
except on requisition from competent persons ; but if the
principle on which the Bill is drawn is allowed to stand
I can see no end to their absurdities, and yet none would
be convicted but ignorant schoolboys who were taking
Thrushes', Robins', Chaffinches' and other common
birds' eggs ; for those are just the birds that would be
named by County Councillors, being all they have ever
heard of.

The mercantile collector who does what mischief is
really done in the case of rare or expiring species would
always get off ; for he would insist on proof being given
that the egg in question was that of one of the prohibited
birds, and would be able to puzzle any ordinary (or even
expert) witness by exhibiting other eggs not to be dis-
tinguished from it, so that no bench could convict.

Another point on which I lay much stress is being
able to implicate any one conveying anybody else to a
reserved place with intent, etc. This would make boat-
men and " trap " drivers very cautious about strangers
of whom they knew nothing ; and there is no pro-
vision for demanding names or detaining suspected
delinquents.

I will not bore you further, and trusting that you will
give the matter your attention,

I remain,

Yours very truly,

ALFRED NEWTON.

At the annual meeting of the Society for the Protec-
tion of Birds, February, 1894, Newton commented on the
Bill of the previous year and expressed the opinion that
if it had been carried, one of the " most useless and mis-
chievous measures would have been added to the
Statute Book." He then proceeded to give his

152 PROTECTION OF BIRDS

audience a practical exhibition of the difficulty, even the
impossibility, of identifying birds' eggs.

I have in this box the egg of a Reeve, side by side
with the egg of a Redshank, and that of a Lapwing, and
the difference can hardly be discovered. If you protect
the Reeve you must extend the same favour to the
Redshank and Lapwing, and thus you interfere with the
Plover's egg trade. The idea of the Committee of the
British Association is to give local authorities power to
protect certain areas, in which you must prohibit the
taking of all eggs within certain dates.

In the same year The Wild Birds' Protection Act,
1894, which was drafted by the Society for the Protection
of Birds, and introduced by Sir Herbert Maxwell, became
law, but it was still marred (in Newton's opinion) by the
attempt to protect by schedule of species, and he still
kept hammering away at trying to induce people to
accept the more practical means of reserved areas.

I do not know whether you ever saw some " Notes '
that I wrote on Maxwell's first Bill (1893)/but they were
reprinted at H. Brown's request in the Scott. Nat. for
last year. The argument I therein advanced is in my
belief as good now as ever, though (as you know) the
existing Act is a modification of what Maxwell originally
intended, but the mischief (as I conceive) of trying to
protect the eggs of species by name still remains as an
alternative. The more I consider the subject the more
certain I am that the principle of " area protection " is
the only one that is practicable, and I much wish your
sandhills, the neighbourhood of Hickling, and I daresay
two or three other places in Norfolk, could be placed
under the Act. But great judgment will be required to
define the limits of each " protected area " as well as the
close-time, whether it is to begin on the 15th April, 1st
or 15th May, 1st of June, and so on. These are points
on which local knowledge is everything, and most likely

R.S.P.B. 153

the close-time should vary in accordance with the
locality. I only pretend to indicate the general line to
be taken, and further than that I have only to say try to
get Walsingham over. He has a way of conciliating
people which would be very useful if he were on your
side, and I know he is that from the part he took in the
House of Lords in 1893.

If it had not been for that fool of a Lord • — I
think Maxwell might have been persuaded to accept the
amendments of his Bill, and all the Terns would have
been safe last year instead of being sacrificed.*

The Society for the Protection of Birds, which was
founded in 1889, received the first guinea towards its
funds from Newton, and always found in him a cordial
helper and adviser. Though he was several times invited
to do so, he would never consent to become a Vice-
President of the Society, possibly because he mistrusted
what he considered to be their somewhat amateurish
methods. He was constantly deploring the mistaken
enthusiasm of people whose letters in the Times and
elsewhere seemed to him to do more harm than good.

" The worst is that people will gush and be sentimental,
and as I found out before, when I had to do with the
Bird Protection Bills in Parliament, the sentimentalists
gave far more trouble than any one else."

Though he condemned the form of the Act of 1894,
and was always hoping that some day a more reasonable
scheme might be adopted, he was bound to admit a few
years later that much good had been effected even by
that imperfect measure.

How to get a commonsense Act of Parliament passed
I don't know. We had one once which was pretty good,
but as you know the poulterers got Harcourt to repeal
the one useful clause in it, when it had existed only for

* Letter to Col. H. W. Feilden, January 9, 1895.

154 PKOTECTION OF BIRDS

about a twelvemonth, and since that time the flood of
silly sentimentalists has swept away everything practic-
able. They have been aided by meddlesome people like

and , who have never been able to understand

the points at issue. In the present state of things I
doubt whether we should be a bit better off for a new
Act ; there is no one to look to it in either House of
Parliament. I think there is no chance of Bryce's Bill
being carried for many a year. There is no doubt as to
the mischief it would do in regard to birds ; and the
Golden Eagle would follow the Sea-Eagle into the
EwigJceit.

I quite agree with you that probably no harm has
been done, or is likely to be done, by taking Crossbills'
and Siskins' nests ; both species are no doubt increasing
in number with the spread of planting in Scotland ; (by
the way, is the Crested Titmouse extending into the new
plantations ? It ought to do so soon ;) but still it is
disgusting that all these nests should be taken just to
put a few shillings or pounds into a man's pocket.

On the other hand, we must recognise the fact that
the Acts have done a great deal of good. The Great-
crested Grebe was all but done for in Norfolk, and is now
flourishing there as well as in other parts of the country.
I hear of Tufted Duck (" in swarms ") everywhere, and
this year there has been a pair of Redshanks breeding
on the wet meadows between this place and Grantchester,
such a thing having been unknown for much more than
50 years.*

The inadequacy (as it seemed to him) of the existing
Acts did not deter Newton from his public-spirited work,
and for many years he devoted much time, as a mass of
correspondence testifies, to attempts at securing proper
protection for certain local species. In 1 893 he persuaded
the Zoological Society to award silver medals to John
Peter Grant, of Rothiemurchus, and Lochiel for their

* Letter to J. A. Harvie-Brown, June 25, 1900.

GREAT SKUAS 155

successful protection of the Ospreys in Scotland. He
also took an active interest in the (at one time) precarious
fate of the Great Skuas in Shetland : —

I learn with much gratification the result of your
interviews with Mrs. Traill, to the effect that Mr. Gilmour
is determined to afford effectual protection to the
Bonxies on Foula. I have no doubt that the Society for
the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals would easily and
readily find fit watchers for next season. But I am
always most anxious that the protection of birds should
not be overdone, as I see great danger of its being. Given
absolute protection to the breeding birds during a proper
' close-time," I am convinced that a certain proportion
of eggs may be safely taken without detriment to the
species. This is the result of very general experience
during a great many years, and herein I find the present
law so very objectionable ; but still so long as it is law
it must be obeyed.

If it were possible to allow people to take Bonxies'
eggs up to a certain day (what the day should be I don't
pretend to know) but not to take a single egg after that
day, the people would have no grievance and I am sure
that the birds would not be less numerous. This, how-
ever, is a consideration rather for legislators than for
others, though such permission would enable the law, as
it is, to be more strictly enforced, without any appearance
of hardship. I know it was intended by those who had
to do with the last Act of Parliament, but by their
blundering ignorance, and the reading of the Act adopted
by the English Home Office, which I believe was adopted
by the Secretary for Scotland, the liberal interpretation
was rejected, and the consequence has been very dis-
astrous in many cases.*

The anomalies of the law were intensely irritating to
him, and perhaps caused him to say unduly hard things
of the legislators.

* A.N to W. Eagle Clarke, July 16, 1900.

156 PROTECTION OF BIRDS

" The watcher we keep on Breydon Water is defied by
the gunners there who want to shoot Spoonbills now
frequenting it, and then a man is fined at Yarmouth for
having two blackbirds in his possession ! " *

An effort was made to remove the protection from
the colony of Terns at Aldeburgh on the ground that
they were responsible for the falling-oS of the inshore
fisheries.

September 10, 1906.

MY DEAR TUCK,

I am glad to see by a newspaper paragraph that
you are taking up the question of the Terns at Aldeburgh
(or Orford) Beach, for it is high time that somebody who
knows something about birds and their ways should do
so. I am too old to fight, and, moreover, I have not the
necessary local knowledge. I have not been there since
June, 1885. I am quite sure that there were not 40 pairs
of Terns on the whole beach, and it is quite absurd for
any one to assert (as I read) that there are now 40,000
birds.

That the inshore fisheries have been " fished out " has
long been notorious. I made a point of it in an Address
I gave to the British Association at the Glasgow meeting
just 30 years ago, and in consequence my good friend
Holdsworth (who had been Secretary to Huxley's Herring
Fishery Commission) fell foul of me and we had a lively
time in Nature. It is the greatest nonsense that can
be to put down the falling-oS to birds of any kind. In
the days when sea-birds of all sorts were ever so much
more numerous round our coasts than they have been
for the last 50 years, there were plenty of fish.

What I want to know, and should be grateful to you
if you could tell me, is the real cause of the present dis-
satisfaction. Are the fishermen honestly but ignorantly
of opinion that the Terns have so multiplied as to become
injurious, or have they been " put up to " this ? If so,
by whom ? When I was last there the Aldeburgh men,

* A.N. to J. A. Harvic- Brown, June 22, 1900.

SHOOTING RAKE BIRDS 157

or, say, a dozen of them, were keen eggers — for profit as
well as sport. May not these men, dissatisfied with the
order of the County Council prohibiting egging, be at the
bottom of it ? What the precise order was I know not :
if it was total prohibition my sympathies could be with
the men ; but if it simply laid down a close-time after
which no eggs were to be taken, it would be reasonable.

Yours very truly,

ALFKED NEWTON.

He objected strongly to the too common practice of
shooting rare birds, but he admitted that there were
cases, as, for instance, when it was impossible otherwise
to identify them, in which shooting might be justifiable.

I am very glad to learn you are endeavouring to
obtain the strange bird you saw. I am generally very
much averse to the common practice of destroying
indiscriminately all foreign stragglers ; but this is just
one of the exceptional cases in which the death of a
victim will in all probability be a real advantage to
Ornithology, and I trust your efforts will be successful.*

It is not quite easy to understand his attitude
towards shooting birds on the autumn migration.

I think we cannot complain of people shooting birds
on the autumn migration, at that season stragglers may
as well fall to the gun as be lost at sea, which would
probably be their fate since they have got " out of their
know," to use a good East Anglian expression. Feilden
writes to me of very young partridges, " squeakers " we
used to call them, being spoken of as " doddermites."
I never heard of the word before, and do not know
whether it is given by Forby. f

Probably he had in his mind only those stragglers
that stray far from their course, for at other times he

* Letter to J. A. Harvie-Brown, April 4, 1867.
t A.N. to T. Southwell, September 16, 1902.

158 PROTECTION OF BIRDS

condemned very strongly the shooting of birds of prey
in the autumn. Many of the Kites and Ospreys that fall
victims to the August gunner are (or were) birds that
had been reared in Britain, and if unmolested would
probably return to breed in the following year.

In spite of his enthusiasm for bird-protection Newton,
always had a very strong sympathy with the true egg-
collector, which must have become evident from the
preceding pages. From his earliest years he had been
a keen collector of eggs, and later he tells how in one
day in April, 1861, he took two nests of the Golden
Eagle in Scotland, " crawling up hill with two sticks."
He was always essentially an out-of-doors man, and,
in spite of his lameness he managed to cover the country
in a wonderful way. A correspondent writes : —

On October 14, 1874, Mr. John Henry Gurney, his
son ( J. H. G.), Professor Newton, and I saw a Swift flying
round Cromer Church tower : six Ring Dotterel at
Northrepps. At this time, as we walked across country,
the Professor declined any help in crossing a hedge, but
instantly threw his crutches (sticks) over it and pitched
himself through it so as to alight on his shoulder (or
head, arms, and shoulder). He seemed expert in going
through without scratch or hurt, in spite of his lameness.

To the end of his life he sympathised with the egg-
collector who was also a naturalist, but he realised fully
the limitations of egg-collecting pure and simple.

I am afraid I may fall somewhat in your estimation
when I tell you that I don't suppose I shall ever again
be able to take the interest in eggs that I did before I
finished my Catalogue. I hope never to lose it, but one
can't help finding that there are many other branches
of Ornithology which are really more important, though
I will never yield to any one in maintaining that there
is nothing like bird's-nesting for bringing you into contact

OOLOGY 159

with the bird and its life ; so that it is in one sense one
of the highest pursuits of Natural Science. But I was
never one of those — or, if ever, that must have been well
over fifty years ago — who thought that " oology ' ' was
going to have an important efiect on phylogeny (i.e.
classification) and so forth.*

* A.N. to F. C. R. Jourdain, March 18, 1907.

CHAPTER X

MIGRATION AND DISTRIBUTION

IN the realm of Ornithology, and, indeed, in all the
study of Nature, there are few questions that appeal so
strongly to the imagination, and few questions of which
man is still so ignorant, as that of the Migration of Birds.
From his boyhood Newton was keenly interested in
migration, and with his brother Edward he kept for
many years a record of the movements of the birds at
Elveden.

The ordinary observer, until lately at least, never
thought of birds being resident as a species while they
were migratory as individuals. Thus it came to pass
that scarcely anybody knew of the migration in this
country of the Song-Thrush, the Redbreast, and others.
It needs a considerable familiarity, not only with the
district, but with the individual birds frequenting it,
to find that out, and in some cases it is very difficult to
do so. I have never been able to observe for myself
any indication of the Hedge-Sparrow being migratory,
yet I feel sure that it is. Fifty years ago I observed the
local movements of the Redbreast, but it was not until
I had passed some two or three seasons (July and August)
in Dorset, that I noticed its actual migration, and that
in considerable numbers.

It seems to me probable, though I cannot prove it,
that the young broods of nearly all birds leave the place
of their birth as soon as they are fit to travel. People
commonly say they are driven away by their parents,
and in some cases that certainly seems to be so ; but I
very much doubt whether it is in the majority of species,

160

MIGEATION OF BIRDS 161

and I suspect the young go of! of their own accord. It
would take a lifetime to make this out, and few men
have the leisure or opportunity for such continuous
observation as would be required. I have been in my
younger days especially favoured in that way ; for
beginning as a boy, I had nearly twenty years of good
opportunities ; but, of course, of those twenty years a
great part was spent in learning one's business, I can't
say in apprenticeship, for that would imply the teaching
or supervision of a master, and master, of course, I had
none. Moreover, during that period there were various
interruptions, such as schools, college, and going abroad
from time to time ; though I had my brother to help me,
and he was a far better observer than I. Our joint
experience, however, points to what I have stated, and
the " Register " we kept for nearly ten years warrants
my having confidence in it ; the more so that since that
time the more I read about migration by good observers
the more I am confirmed in the opinion.*

The letters of ill-informed persons to the newspapers
about migration, not less than about bird protection,
roused Newton's wrath. The ' silly season ' of 1874
was marked by a discussion of this sort, which impelled
him to write to Nature a masterly exposition of the facts
of migration as far as they were then understood. The
discussion began with a theory of migration set forth by
a Scandinavian poet, which treated that movement as
an attempt on the part of the birds to obtain more light.
It is not certain whether the theory was advanced in
earnest or merely as a poetic fancy, but it is obvious
that it contains its own refutation. The first letter,
which professed to give the ' ' latest accepted theory '
on the subject and which prompted Newton to reply,
is so remarkable that extracts may be quoted from it
here.

* Letter to W. Eagle-Clarke, February 2, 1901.

M

162 MIGKATION AND DISTRIBUTION

I believe it was only some twenty or thirty years ago
that anything like a practical solution of the difficulty was
arrived at. The birds congregating about the south
coast are seized with a sudden impulse or mania to fly
upwards. This is caused by some atmospheric change
coinciding with a warm south wind moving in a high
stratum, into which the birds soar with an involuntary
motion of their wings. This motion (involuntary like
that of the heart) is continued for many hours, and the
birds fly blindly along until the paroxysm passes off, when
they at once begin to descend, making many a fatal drop
into the sea.

The same phenomenon occurs in Africa and southern
countries, where the migratory birds congregate for a
northern flight about April. Experiments were tried here
and in Africa which tended to corroborate the above
facts. Migratory birds were kept in cages along the
coast, and it was found that each was seized with a pro-
longed paroxysm coinciding with the time that the wild
birds disappeared. Cages were constructed with silk at
top and bottom to prevent the birds from killing them-
selves ; and it was noticed that after the paroxysm had
passed away, the birds began to look about them, to
plume themselves, and eat and drink, apparently with a
notion that they had arrived at their new home.*

Of this Newton writes : —

On reading these wonderful paragraphs, some ques-
tions naturally arise. How does the writer account for
his " birds congregating about the south coast " ? What
brings them there, that they may be ' seized with a
sudden impulse or mania to fly upwards " ? Who has
ever observed the " atmospheric change " and coincident
' warm south wind moving in a high stratum " ? Do
these remarkable meteorological phenomena occur but
once in the whole season of migration, or is there a suc-
cession of them to suit the convenience of each migratory
species ? Who, moreover, has seen the birds soar into

* Times, September 18, 1874.

CAUSE OF MIGRATION 163

this peculiar current of air ? and who of such fortunate
persons knows that the motion of their wings under such
conditions is ' involuntary like that of the heart " ?
Finally, what is the cause of the " paroxysm " ? for, with-
out knowing that, to attempt to explain the observed
facts of migration is an attempt to explain obscurum per
obscurius.

When a satisfactory answer is given to these questions,
it will be time to inquire whether this " latest accepted
theory " of migration sets the matter in any clearer light,
or whether it is not as arrant nonsense as was ever foisted
upon an innocent public, even at the height of the " silly
season." The last paragraph of the writer's letter, I may
remark, has nothing in it of consequence. Granting that
the migratory impulse is instinctive, it is, like other in-
stinctive practices, followed as far as circumstances will
allow.*

Then follows an admirable statement of the original
causes of migration, and of the modes of migration,
ending with the question :

" How is it that birds find their way back to their
old home ? ' This seems to me the most inexplicable
part of the whole matter. I cannot even offer an
approach to its solution. . . . Here I have no theory
to advance, no prejudice to sustain. I should be thank-
ful indeed for any hypothesis that would be in accord-
ance with observed facts. . . . The solution is probably
simple in the extreme — possibly before our eyes at this
moment if we could but see it — but whosoever discovers
it will assuredly deserve to have his name remembered
•among those of the greatest discoverers of this or any
age.

With the caution — perhaps even excessive — that
was so characteristic of him, Newton would never permit
himself to advance any general theory of migration, nor
was he even satisfied with any of the theories suggested

* Nature, September 24, 1874.

164 MIGRATION AND DISTRIBUTION

by others. It is, indeed, hardly too much to say he
despaired of an answer ever being brought forward to
the great question — in his own time, at all events.

With much that you say I wholly agree, though I
can't attach much value to what has hitherto been
written about " Land routes " of migration and so on.
There may be such things, indeed, I will go so far as to
say that such things probably exist, but as yet we really
know next to nothing about them. The worst of it is,
I don't see my way at present to knowing much more,
for want of well-placed and trustworthy observers.
The ordinary man who records his first Swallow and so
on, however faithful he may be, goes very little way to
help, and how to improve him I don't know.

Even if I had kept a record of my own observations
on birds travelling by night, since I took up my permanent
abode at Cambridge, it would tell me very little that
would be of use ; and I take it that in all that time few
people have had opportunities so good as mine ; for my
habit of working late at night and, except in really cold
weather, with a window open, is not one that many
indulge. I can only, as a general result, say that when
the sky is clear one hears nothing ; but given a cloudy
sky, from the end of July to the middle of October, the
chances are one hears birds fly over. What birds they
are it is nearly always impossible to say, because the
generality seem to use a different language when travel-
ling.

After long experience I have come to the supposition
that certain notes are uttered by Oyster-catchers ; but
I never heard an Oyster-catcher utter such a note by
daytime or when he is at home ! It is very rarely that
one catches an unmistakable note, a Cuckow's, a Red-
shank's, or a Golden Plover's, yet hundreds of them must
be passing over.

There is plenty more to be done in the migration way,
if we only knew how to do it.*

* Letter to J. A. Harvie-Brown, September 9, 1900.

MIGRATION REPORT 165

I am glad of the good progress you have been making
in the Migration Report. It is impossible for me to say
what your ingenuity may not have evolved out of all
the records in the Field and elsewhere that you have
been working at ; but I own I shall be surprised if you
are able to lay down any " land routes," my ideas being
that local influence is beyond human intelligence and
consequently calculation. However, we shall see, and
I will admit that there are a few recorded facts that seem
to show it is subject to rule : e.g. I have known year
after year a Woodcock to be flushed under a particular
tree, fly out to the open in a particular place, and be then
shot by a gun placed for the purpose ! Then there is
that Rough-legged Buzzard which used to fly year after
year to a particular dead tree at Northrepps and be
always shot dead ! These things incline one to believe that
there may be land routes ; but who is to lay them down ? *

Barrington's evidence as to long-winged or short-
winged examples of the same species of bird strongly
confirms what I put forth in " D.B." (p. 557), and that
is really only the legitimate deduction of what Tristram
had already observed in the passage (Ibis, 1865, p. 77),
to which I there refer. There is nothing to show that
the age of the individual has anything to do with the
matter, and I don't think it has. It is simply that the
longest-winged birds go furthest in each direction, and
apparently start soonest. It seems to me quite natural
that they should do so. The tendency of long-winged
individuals is to breed others as long-winged, or even
longer, and so the thing goes on, and has been going on
for ages. This may point to the polar origin of life, and
certainly does not contradict such a supposition ; but
it can't be said to go far to support it. All I think one
can say is that if the hypothesis that Life originated at
the Pole be true, the fact would very likely account for
the facts as we find them. Further than that it would
hardly be safe to go at present, j

* Letter to W. Eagle-Clarke, AprU 7, 1900.

f Letter to J. A. Harvie-Brown, November 2, 1900.

166 MIGRATION AND DISTRIBUTION

He often talked and wrote to his friends of the birds
he heard passing over Cambridge on dark nights.
' Owing to my practice of writing late at night these
thirty years or more, with a sliding pane in my window
let down, I have observed that they come from the N.E.
in a straight line — flock after flock."

If he was unwilling to formulate a theory of migra-
tion, he was always eager to point out the fallacy in any
of the new ideas or to show the absurdity of ancient
superstitions. Of these latter, the hardest to die was
the theory that birds hibernated in a torpid state, and
he declared that on this point only in connection with
this subject could we boast ourselves to be clearly wiser
than our ancestors. But year after year, instances of
this curious belief presented themselves to him either in
public print or in private communications.

I forget all about Kalm's story ; but it is really not
so uncommon for people to be able to persuade them-
selves of the truth of anything they want to believe, as
Mr. Gladstone was said to do. I was once almost
stumped by a story about torpid Swallows till provi-
dentially a witness presented himself and explained the
whole thing by stating that they were Bats !

I had a bit of fun once in Nature with the late Duke
of Argyll, who pretended that his brother-in-law (I think
it was) had seen Swallows or Martins dug out of the bank
of the Tigris or Euphrates. I doubt whether the Duke
believed it, but he felt bound in honour to stand up for
his informant.

Elliott Coues was much inclined to believe in torpidity,
perhaps did believe in it, but was ashamed to declare his
belief, for he had enough physiological knowledge to
know that such a thing is all but impossible in a bird.
No one has ever traced or ever will trace the bounds of
human credulity ; for the last ten days or more people
have been writing letters to the Times, nearly all

SUPEKSTITIONS 167

expressing their belief in " dowsing," and that is evidently
the belief of the editor or proprietor, or both.

I must look up my Olaus Magnus ; I think he gives
a, woodcut with an amusing scene of Swallows being
taken out of a fishing net, and it might be worth while
for you to have this copied and inserted in your book.*

Of the same kind is the equally ancient belief that
little birds get themselves conveyed from one country
to another by their bigger brethren. Storks and Cranes
on their migration are manifest to beholders, but the
transit of lesser birds of feebler flight is seldom evident,
and when, as often happens, large and small birds dis-
appear or arrive simultaneously, what is more natural
than that the ignorant should suppose that the latter
should avail themselves of the former as a vehicle ?
Thus in 1740 the Tartars of Krasnoyarsk assured
J. G. Gmelin (Reise durch Siberien) that when autumn
came each Crane took a Corncrake on its back and
transplanted it to a warm land, while the well-known
belief of the Egyptian peasant that Cranes and
Storks bring a living load was not long since gravely
promulgated in this country as a truth, f

One would like to know what measure of scorn he
would have poured on the theory recently, and (it is
said) seriously suggested, that the Cuckow lays her eggs
in the nests of other birds in return for her services as
guide from southern lands !

In the much discussed question of migration routes
he took the deepest interest, and he had the highest
opinion of the work of Professor Palmen ; but later it-
appeared that his belief in routes was shaken, and he
returned to the more tenable creed that every species
on migration goes its own way, and what is called a
migration route is only the coincidence of the way taken
by more or few of them.

* Letter to W. Eagle Clarke, January 11 ., 1905,
t " Dictionary of Birds?," p. 550.

168 MIGRATION AND DISTRIBUTION

I think we don't know enough about the routes of
birds, if routes there be, to say which are the best stations
for observing them, and these can only be found out by
continuous series of observations.

We want a score or so of Gatkes begotten and perched
on a score or so of lighted-up islands and lightships all
round ; then one might do something more than guess
warily ; but even thus the " personal equation " has to
be taken into consideration. I think there is as little
chance of there being another Gatke born as there is of
another Gilbert White, Shakespeare, or Robert Burns !

I hope that Clarke's Redpoll studies will not send him
into a Lunatic Asylum ; mine nearly did so with me,
but fortunately I had Dresser to share the trouble, and
we continued to keep ourselves sane — at least apparently
so. I think Redpolls are like the Apocalypse, their
study finds a man mad (like poor Coues for instance), or
makes him so. For this reason I wish X— — would
take them up, and then peradventure he might be finally
interned in Colney Hatch and cease to do evil ; that he
should learn to do well I think impossible. But I am
growing tolerant in my old age, and look upon sub-
speciefiers as Mohammedans look upon Franks ; un-
comfortable creations that Allah for some purpose of
his own permits to exist, an old but apt simile.*

He had the greatest admiration for Herr Gatke, of
whom he wrote that, " through his watchfulness Heligo-
land has attained celebrity as a post of observation quite
beyond any other in the world, so that ornithologists
may at times wonder whether the man made the station
or the station the man — so fitted have they been for one
another." The two men very frequently corresponded,
but they only met once, when Newton was taken to
Heligoland on board a friend's yacht. At the end of
his stay, when he was stepping into the dinghy to take
him on board again, Newton had the misfortune to slip

: Letter to J. A. Harvie-Brown, January 9, 1906.

GATKE OF HELIGOLAND 169

and ruptured an important tendon in his sound leg.
Thenceforward he went always with two instead of, as
formerly, with one stick, or (in the words of a friend of
his) from a three-legged he became a four-legged man.

With one of Herr Gatke's points Newton found
himself unable to agree, and that was with regard to
the speed at which migrating birds travel. Gatke
maintained that Grey Crows flew from Heligoland to
Lincolnshire in three hours, at a rate of 120 miles an
hour, a speed which it would appear impossible for a
bird of the crow kind to attain. Still more wonderful
was Gatke's contention that the Bluethroat flies from
the Nile Delta to Heligoland in nine hours, and his
observations of Curlews and Plovers, which were timed
to cross the island of Heligoland, a distance of rather
more than four miles, in one minute. Against these
Newton set the commonly observed instances of Swallows
and Partridges, which are easily outstripped by a railway
train, and the speed of Carrier Pigeons, which was de-
clared by Mr. Tegetmeier to be about thirty-six miles
an hour.

Though it seemed that he almost despaired of an
answer ever being given to the fundamental questions of
migration, he spared neither time nor trouble in trying
to investigate the facts, so far as they might be observed,
of that wonderful movement. It was mainly owing to
his initiation that the British Association appointed in
1880 a committee to inquire into the migration of birds.
For twenty-three years (1880-1903) Newton presided
over this committee, which collected a great mass of
valuable information, chiefly through the untiring energy
of Mr. J. A. Harvie-Brown and the late Mr. John Cor-
deaux. One of the schemes originated by the committee,
in which he took the most active interest, was that of
observing migration from lighthouses and light- vessels,

170 MIGRATION AND DISTRIBUTION

and he gave unfailing assistance and advice to Mr. Eagle
Clarke, who isolated himself in those remote places during
his vacations for several years, with most valuable results.
One of the first journeys Mr. Eagle Clarke took on
this account was to the lighthouse at Ushant in 1898 ;
Newton gave him considerable assistance in getting the
necessary permission, but the trip came to an untimely
end : —

Clarke, who went with a Government grant and the
sanction of the French authorities to Ushant to make
observations on bird migration, found himself the object
of suspicion and so dogged by a gendarme, sent specially
from Paris to look after him, that he gave it up, on the
advice of H.M. Consul at Brest — in order 'to avoid
serious consequences ': —as a bad job and came away re
infecta. The military prison of Chcrche Midi in Paris
seems to be the proper place for a spy who passed off as
an observer of autumnal migration. I wonder if the
French authorities thought of that ?

But the visit was not altogether a failure, and some
very interesting flights of migrants were seen.

It is very good to find that after all your visit to
Ushant has produced something, and I congratulate
you on the excellent reports you have received. I
only hope they will not bring the reporters into collision
with the authorities, or your friends may find themselves
condemned as traitors to the Isle du Diable ! How they
must have enjoyed the ' petits oiseaux ' that killed
themselves, for there is nothing by way of ' gibier '
that Frenchmen more delight in !

Without turning to Gatke I forget what is the
greatest number known to have been killed at Heligo-
land ; but 1500 in one night seems to be a very big bag.

I heard the other day of a saying either from York-
shire or Lincolnshire which pleased me much. A man
said that there was such an arrival of Golden-crested

BIRDS AT A LIGHT-VESSEL 171

Wrens on the shore, that the bushes were " lousy " with
them.*

In the autumn of 1903 Mr. Eagle Clarke spent thirty-
one days on board the Kentish Knock light-vessel, and
during the last two days he was there he saw one of the
largest movements of birds that any ornithologist had
ever witnessed : —

From Saturday at 11 a.m. until Sunday at 4 p.m.
Starlings and Larks in extraordinary numbers passed
from E. to W. without a break, i.e. a day and night. . . .
No one who has not witnessed these E. to W. flights
can form any idea of the countless numbers of those
and other species crossing the North Sea at this season.
On Saturday afternoon the first Jackdaws and Rooks
appeared in small numbers. On Saturday at 6.30 p.m.
and down to 5 a.m. on Sunday we had crowds of birds
at the lantern — Starlings, Larks, Meadowpipits, Chaf-
finches, Goldcrests, Mistlethrushes, Song Thrushes, and
a few Rooks and Jackdaws (the two latter species being
captured at the lantern). It was pitiable to see the
numbers that rained overboard. They could only be
estimated at thousands. Very few fell on deck owing
to the wind which prevailed at the time, and which
carried the victims beyond our reach. The species
mentioned were captured by means of a hand net by
a seaman stationed on the top of the lantern, who
netted them like so many moths as they approached the
lantern. In this way we took species varying from the
tiny Goldcrest to the clumsy Rook ! f

In acknowledging this letter Newton wrote :-

It is very gratifying to know that you are pleased
with the whole thing, and certainly the experiences of
your last day or two will be something to remember for
ever. It is indeed a striking instance of the enormous
sacrifice of individual life made by Nature, I suppose for

* Letter to W. Eagle Clarke, November 20, 1898.
t Letter from W. Eagle Clarke, October 21, 1903.

172 MIGRATION AND DISTRIBUTION

the benefit of the species, but it is hard to see how the
machinery works. However, I am not going to descant
on this now. Clearly your observations have been more
interesting than those on the Eddystone, and I hope we
shall have from you a paper in the Ibis accordingly ; but
more than that they ought to help enormously towards
that book on migration generally that I have long been
hoping you will one day write ; for you of all men are
the man to do it. Still, still the great mystery of how
the birds do it remains, and that I begin to fear will
never be explained in my time ; but it is no deterrent,
or ought not to be, to you.

The more the facts of migration are ascertained the
more likely are we (or our successors) to understand what
brings them about ; so I trust you will be setting
seriously to work on what ought to be a great book,
which will cast into shade everything that has been
written before, even the good Barrington's excellent
performance.

Often as I have thought over what appears to be the
' waste " of bird life at sea (a thing which very few people
ever take in at all) this last letter of yours fills me with
fresh and ever-increasing amazement. The slaughter, if
one may so call it, seems so indiscriminate ; there can be
scarcely room for Natural Selection to act. Were you
able to form any opinion as to the proportion of young
to old birds, or were the troops almost wholly one or
the other ? *

Mr. Clarke could not return a satisfactory answer to
the last question, owing to the high speed at which the
birds were travelling, but he remarked :—

I have a number of notes on the subject of old and
young, but in the vast 'majority of cases it was quite
impossible to say what the flocks were composed of in
this respect. As to the waste of life, I am afraid Nature
never contemplated lighthouse and lightship lanterns,
and it is difficult to see how she works, if she works at

* Letter to W. Eagle Clarke, October 22, 1903.

DESTRUCTION OF MIGRANTS 173

all, in this particular connection. We should expect
fewer old birds to perish, and yet what a vast number do !

Referring to this destruction of birds at lightships,
Newton wrote : —

It does not seem to me that the destruction of life is
due to the lightships. They only enable one to see it.
It would surely go on nearly the same if there were no
lights. The birds are evidently lost already, and they
only make for the light in the want of any other directive
impulse. Unless the weather cleared or something else
(one hardly knows what) happened, they would fly on
aimlessly till they fell from exhaustion, perhaps on land,
most likely into the sea. It is a dreadful problem, one
to keep one awake at night thinking upon it.

In one way it is plain that Natural Selection does act.
The birds that migrate successfully, and so carry on the
species, must be of the best, any shortcoming must carry
a fatal penalty ; but what a lot of unlucky individuals
there must be ! *

It was at Newton's suggestion that Mr. Eagle Clarke
decided to write his invaluable book on migration, and
he gave him help in a hundred ways in the task. Newton's
knowledge of the old writers on Natural History was
profound, and he was able to make many suggestions for
the chapter on the history of migration.

January 5, 1905.

MY DEAR CLARKE,

Such an introduction to your book would be
most desirable if not necessary, and I am sure I will
gladly help you all I can. Nothing like it has, I think,
been attempted of late years, and the old attempts are
sure to be full of errors, because so much has turned up
since they were written. I have never gone regularly
into the business and I can't say off hand what Aristotle's
or Pliny's views on migration were ; but it will not be

* Letter to W. Eagle Clarke, October 24, 1903.

174 MIGRATION AND DISTRIBUTION

very difficult to make out, the one drawback in the
former case being that you never know what is his and
what is his reporter's or note-taker's, for I am one of
those who think that his text has been overlaid by some
one else.

The best edition of Aristotle on Animals is that by
Aubert and Wimmer, which has a capital index and a
German translation to face the Greek, and that I can
lend you at any time. I have also Sillig's edition of
Pliny, which is said to be the best, and that is equally at
your service whenever you are ready for it ; but I
suppose you are not going to begin immediately. I think
you must not trust Bostock and Riley without comparing
their version with the original. The English translations
of Aristotle are too misleading to have anything to
do with.

A much more troublesome job will be that offered by
the mediaeval writers, if you meddle with them or their
successors of the Renaissance, Belm, Gesner and Aldro-
vandi ; but you have to be on your guard that
' hibernation " as used by them is restricted to its proper
meaning — wintering — and not necessarily in a torpid
condition. I think the belief in torpidity and sub-
mergence is comparatively recent, and it is indeed
astonishing what a hold it obtained on otherwise sound-
thinking men. Most certainly there is no sign of the
real ancients, Homer and Job, holding it.

If I remember right, Pliny had a great notion of birds
being transmuted ; the Cuckow becoming a Sparrow-
Hawk in winter, and the Redstart a Redbreast ; but
Pliny was a very child-like person in many ways, though
he met his end as a man of science should. I have a,
notion (which may be wrong) that the submergence
theory was invented in the North, Olaus Magnus and
people of that sort.

Anyhow a history of opinion on migration would be a
delightful thing to write, and write it I hope you will.

Yours very truly,

ALFRED NEWTON.

GEOGRAPHICAL DISTRIBUTION 175

Though he did all that was in his power to forward
this study, the same note, almost of despair of solving
the great question, sounds in all his writings on the
subject of migration :-

Lay down the paths of migrating birds, observe
their comings and goings, or strive to account for the
impulse which urges them forward as we will, there still
remains for consideration the most marvellous thing of
all — How do the birds find their way so unerringly from
such immense distances ?

A writer * in the Contemporary Review, giving a some-
what fanciful description of the " army of birds " on the
Spring Migration, remarked that it was " like the
Kingdom of Heaven which cometh not by observation."
Newton justly retorted that all we know of migration is
due to observation, and nearly all we do not know to
want of it.

Closely connected with Migration is the Geographical
Distribution of Birds. The publication in 1876 of
Wallace's great book t was welcomed by Newton as an
event —

that will, if I am not mistaken, in after ages charac-
terise the present year as an epoch in the history of our
sciences inferior only in importance to that which marked
some eighteen or nineteen years ago the promulgation
of a reasonable Theory of Evolution by Mr. Darwin and
Mr. Wallace. And while it is to the latter of these two
naturalists that we owe the boon that has recently been
conferred on us, it is unquestionably from the former
labours of both — united yet distinct — that the boon
acquires its greatest value.

He was careful, however, to add that he by no means

* The Duke of Argyll, Contemporary Review, July, 1880.

t " The Geographical Distribution of Animals, with a Study of the
relations of living and extinct Faunas as elucidating the Past Changes of
the Earth's Surface." By Alfred Ruseel Wallace, 2 vols.

176 MIGRATION AND DISTRIBUTION

pinned his faith to all the author's details or to all his
conclusions.

As was the case with many other naturalists, he had
long been groping in the dark with regard to this
question, and Wallace's book immediately let in a flood
of light.

With regard to the Ptarmigan question I think I can
tell you exactly how the mistake of admitting Lagopus
rupestris as a British bird originated. More than a
century since Edwards described and figured under the
name of ' Rock Grouse " a Ptarmigan from Hudson's
Bay, which as the figure now shows must have been a
hen bird in the orange-yellow plumage of the breeding
season, and on this figure was founded the species known
in systems as Tetrao (or Lagopus) rupestris — a name
which is therefore applicable to the smaller black-tailed
Ptarmigan of the northern parts of North America.

The different plumages assumed by the Ptarmigan of
Europe were for a long time little known, and for at
least the first twenty years of the present century it was
generally (I do not say universally) assumed among
naturalists that this bird had but two states of plumage,
being white in winter and grey in summer, this last
assumption being, as we now know, partly an error, since
in the breeding season, i.e. at the beginning of summer,
the plumage of the hen is orange-yellow, while the grey
dress is put on later in the summer and may be more
correctly called the autumnal plumage. However, this
fact was not generally known to the naturalists of the
time who (with perhaps a few exceptions) believed that
the summer plumage of the European Ptarmigan was
grey and that of the American orange-yellow.

Under this belief, some thirty years or more ago (I
cannot, in the absence of books, speak positively), a hen
Ptarmigan was sent from Scotland to (I think) Lord
Stanley in orange-yellow plumage, the ordinary plumage
of the breeding season, and as at that time it was con-
sidered that the American species only assumed a dress

THE PTARMIGAN 177

of this colour, it was naturally thought that this Scotch
specimen belonged to the American species, and accord-
ingly Lagopus rupestris was enrolled as a British bird.
This appears from Mr. Eyton's book and I think also
from the " Fauna Boreali- Americana."

When it was subsequently discovered that the hen of
the Scotch Ptarmigan had a breeding-plumage of orange-
yellow like that hitherto supposed to be peculiar to the
American bird, the presumption became strong that those
who considered Lord Stanley's specimen to belong to
L. rupestris were mistaken, and this presumption became
almost proved when time went on and no one could
point to a Scotch specimen of a cock bird with the
characters of L. rupestris.

For myself I feel well assured that there is no reason-
able ground for supposing that L. rupestris has ever
occurred in Scotland.

That you should find the Ptarmigan of the hill-tops
in Sutherland and thereabout smaller than those fre-
quenting a lower zone is quite in accordance with what
I should suppose would be the case, but I cannot believe
that any valid specific distinction can be made out
between them. Look how Grouse and Partridges vary
in size according to the district in which they are reared,
but indeed there is no need to draw examples from other
species, since the Ptarmigan itself, to my knowledge,
supplies instances. The largest Ptarmigan I ever saw
or handled was obtained on the island of Qvalo (on which
Hammerfest stands), I think two of them would almost
weigh as much as three from the mountainous frontier
region of Norway, Sweden and Finland, and the fact may
I believe be explained thus : Owing to the influence of
the Gulf Stream Qvalo (though situated further north)
enjoys winters much less long and severe than does the
mountain tract in question, and one may safely assume
that the Ptarmigan of the former are better fed and
consequently as a rule larger than those of the latter. In
like manner the Ptarmigans of your middle hill zone are
larger (as you say) than those of the summits. The fact

N

178 MIGRATION AND DISTRIBUTION

your informant mentioned of the hilltop Ptarmigan
assuming their winter plumage earlier than the birds
lower down shows that the winter there is longer, as of
course, might have been predicated, and it is extremely
interesting to me to have my observations of the Nor-
wegian birds borne out by yours of the Scotch ones. The
very fact you mention of the Ptarmigan being scarce
on the Sutherland hilltops and plentiful lower down
shows that the conditions of their existence on the
former are less favourable to them than where less
exposed.

As to Lagopus montanus, as I have said elsewhere, I
believe that all the mountain Ptarmigans of Europe
(exclusive of Iceland and Spitzbergen) are referable to
one and the same species, viz. L. mutus, but I must
confess that I have not had all the opportunities I should
like of comparing Ptarmigans from the Alps and Pyrenees
with those of Scotland and Scandinavia. It is true that
the Swiss and Pyrenean birds are now completely isolated
and cut off by a wide interval from their northern
brethren, but no one can doubt that there was a time
and that (geologically speaking) not so long ago when the
range of the species was uninterrupted. Bones of the
Willow Grouse and Snowy Owl are found in the French
bone-caverns very far south, contemporary with those
of the Rein-Deer, and it is pretty plain that as that
glacial epoch gradually disappeared birds of the habits
of the Ptarmigan would be driven (by the coming of a
warmer climate) to the mountains, while they would
cease to exist in the low countries.*

Although he would never commit himself in his
published writings to theories of migration and distribu-
tion, he sometimes allowed himself to speculate on such
matters in correspondence with his friends : —

I never made any notes that would be of any use to
you on the polar distribution of animals, for I did not

* Letter to J. A. Harvie-Brown, October 11, 1869.

ORIGIN OF LIFE 179

get far enough for that at the time when I was thinking
whether I could bring the subject into a lecture. What
then occurred to me was little more than this :-

Life on the earth most likely had its origin at one of
the poles, since there conditions that admit of its existence
would first occur as the planet was slowly cooling down.

Gradually Life, now differentiated into Plant Life and
Animal Life, made its way towards the Equator, and in
so doing became more and more differentiated.

Then must (?) have come a change which wholly or
almost wholly divested the poles or pole of Life, confining
it to equatorial regions. Such a change as this was
probably more than once repeated in the course of various
geological epochs. When things pretty much as we know
them now came to be established there was (and is)
probably very little if anything left of the primeval polar
life ; for setting aside the possible total extinction of it
through severity of climatic conditions, evolution would
have so far improved the forms that were travelling
polewards that any vestiges of the original polar life
would be swept away by the better-fitted newcomers.

But of course all this, or very nearly all, is absolute
speculation. The most that can be said in its favour is
that such facts as we know do not seem to contradict it.
So long as the " Geological Record " is so imperfect I do
not see how we are to advance further.

Moreover, you will see that my speculations had
reference to periods long anterior to even the Eocene.
In the Eocene period nearly all the big divisions that we
have now were already well established ; e.g. Birds,
Hesperornis and Ickthyornis, one Ratite the other Cari-
nate. If the Miocene coal-beds at Discovery Bay ever
yield any Vertebrate remains they will probably be
found very like things that now exist, and to judge from
the analogy of botanical remains, they may be more
like things of Europe and North America than those of
South America or New Australia, not to say New
Zealand.*

* Letter to Col. H. W. FeDden, January 7, 1886.

180 MIGRATION AND DISTRIBUTION

Tiianks for your annotated copy of the Rednecked
Flareup [Phalarope] ; but some of the questions you ask
are easier put than answered. What is " Arctic " in one
longitude may be only " Subarctic " in another ; and as
for " Boreal " or even " Polar," the meaning assigned to
them (especially the former) depends much on the fancy
of the inquirer. There can't be a doubt, I think, that
Phalaropus fulicarius has a more northern range than
P. hyperboreus, and might be almost justifiably called
' Polar " ; yet it does breed, as I have every reason to
believe, in the S.W. corner of Iceland, a good way short
of the Arctic Circle. One does not know what to make
of these things, or whether there is any use in labelling
such or such a species as "Polar," 'Arctic" and the
like.

I wish one knew what ordinarily becomes of the
multitudes of Phalaropes of either species when they
come southward at the end of summer. Occasionally
something goes wrong and then they occur here (two, if
not three, Grey Phalaropes were one autumn killed in the
Cam at the bottom of the gardens of this college, not 300
yards from where I am now writing, 15 or 20 years ago),
there and everywhere, and ingenious persons sit down to
compile a ' wreck chart ; ' it would be more to the
purpose to know the course of their successful voyages.
Do they, like other LimicolcB,v!\i\g their way by night
unseen of us to Southern waters ; or do they herd with
the millions of Rotches, Brunnich's Guillemots, and so

'* * '

on, in some parts of the Atlantic rarely visited or never
by the observing ornithologist ?

It is interesting to read of " record bags " of Wood-
cocks and so forth in Shetland or elsewhere, but depend
upon it those are the exceptional events in the economy
of a species, the very fact of their being " records " proves
that, but (I humbly think) proves very little else.

This afternoon we had a snowstorm, and in half an
hour what seemed to be nearly an inch of snow fell, but
that only shows what the weather when it has a mind to
be malicious can do ; but it is not in the ordinary course

HOLARCTIC REGION 181

of things that it should occur on April 15. Don't think
for a moment that I despise these inquiries ; very
far from it. If our excellent forefathers, whose souls I
trust are with the saints, had only made similar observa-
tions, we should know more. I only object to arriving
at conclusions on very slight evidence.*

There was, however, one important point about
which he had no hesitation in declaring his difference
from Wallace, and that was in regard to the latter's
Nearctic and Palaearctic Regions. Newton found many
reasons for grouping these two, with certain important
modifications, into one, which he called the " Holarctic,"
and he had the satisfaction later of seeing his views
accepted by other biologists. He lost no opportunities
of acquiring information about the faunas of debatable
regions, more particularly of those oceanic islands, which
always had for him the greatest fascination.

One thing I beseech you to look out for. The amiable
land-reformer Wallace makes the Cape Verd Islands
" Palsearctic," to the humble disciple who now addresses
you they seem to be " Ethiopian." May it be your lot
to settle this point, and that you may settle it I pray
you not to stick only to birds, delightful and always
blessed as they are, but pocket all the shells, glycerine
all the beetles, pin all the butterflies and other bugs,
and in fact do all you can in the way of collecting down
to the " lowest marines."

After behaving in this fashion the odour of sanctity
which clings to your head will be enormously intensified
and become a quintessence of sweet savour ; but please
to remember I don't care a button whether you prove
these islands to be Paloearctic or Ethiopian, I only want
to know the truth, though I admit it would be incon-
venient if you were to find they were Neotropical ; but
then I can trust you, for you do not seek a reputation

* Letter to J. A. Harvie-Brown, April 15, 1903.

182 MIGRATION AND DISTRIBUTION

to be obtained only by the discovery of mare's nests, as
is the fashion nowadays.*

He had much correspondence, always of a very
friendly nature, with Mr. Wallace, and so far as this
question is concerned, it ended with the following
letter : —

Magdalene College, Cambridge,

June 17, 1894.

MY DEAR WALLACE,

I thank you very much for the paper you have
sent me. I saw the title of it advertised and got a copy
of Natural Science accordingly — reading it with interest
but with no little regret, though I have no fault to find
with the way in which you defend your position and
attack mine. Indeed, I highly appreciate your delicacy
and feel sure of your wish to do nothing but bring out
the truth. I should much like to reply to you, but I
really don't know when I can find time to do so. I am
off on Tuesday for a three weeks' holiday beyond the
reach, I hope, of posts. I will only remark now that you
proceed on the supposition that my " Holarctic " Region
=your Palaearctic and Nearctic — whereas the southern
boundaries of this last are, in my opinion and that of
several American zoologists, very uncertain — though to
me it is clear that the Neotropical Region extends much
more to the northward than you would have it run — and
probably the same is to be said of the Indian Region.
Thus a very considerable number of the genera, which
you assign to your Nearctic and Palsearctic Regions,
belong really to more southern areas, and by their
elimination your lists would present a very different
aspect. Again, too, you have omitted from your Nearctic
list all the Palaearctic genera of birds which inhabit
Alaska, and if I am not mistaken there are several
Mammals also, making Alaska essentially Palsearctic.
There are also not a few other (as it seems to me)
inaccuracies, which would make no small change.

* Letter to Canon H. B. Tristram, February 16, 1889.

ADDRESS AT MANCHESTER 183

I have always looked on the study of Geographical
Distribution as having a most important bearing on
Evolution — but the greater part of this bearing would
really be obscured, if your doctrines be correct. I do
not know that there is much use in having " Regions '
at all, but certainly there is very little if they are to be
considered for the most part identical with the main
division, ordinarily accepted by geographers. I have,
however, a strong belief in "Faunas," as you may see
from what I foreshadowed at the end of my British
Association address at Manchester some years ago.

Yours very truly,

ALFRED NEWTON.

The passage in his address at Manchester, to which
allusion is made in the foregoing letter, so well exhibits
Newton's broadness of mind that it may fittingly be
quoted here : —

... I would, by way of conclusion, offer a few re-
marks on the aspect which the subject of Geographical
Distribution presents to me. Some of us zoologists — I
am conscious of having myself been guilty of what I am
about to condemn — have been apt to speak of Zoological
Regions as if they were, and always had been, fixed areas.
I am persuaded that if we do this we fall into an error as
grievous as that of our predecessors, who venerated the
fixity of species. One of the best tests of a biologist is
his being able to talk or write of ' ' species ' without
believing that the term is more than a convenient counter
for the exchange of ideas. In the same way I hold that
a good biologist should talk or write of ' Zoological
Regions." The expression no doubt arose out of the
belief, now scouted by all, in Centres of Creation ; and,
as sometimes used, the vice of its birth still clings to it.
To my mind the true meaning of the phrase " Zoological
Region " is that of an area inhabited by a fauna which is,
so to speak, a " function " of the period of its develop-
ment and prevalence over a great part of the habitable

184 MIGRATION AND DISTRIBUTION

globe, but at any rate of the period of its reaching the
portion of the earth's surface where we now find it. One
great thing to guard against is the presumption that the
fauna originated within its present area and has been
always contained therein. Thus I take it that the fauna
which characterises the New Zealand Region — for I follow
Professor Huxley in holding that a region it is fully
entitled to be called — is the comparatively little-changed
relic and representative of an early fauna of much wider
range ; that the characteristic fauna of the Australian
Region exhibits in the same way that of a later period :
and that of the Neotropical Region of one later still. But
while the first two regions have each been so long
isolated that a large proportion of their fauna remains
essentially unaltered, the last has never been so com-
pletely severed, and has received, doubtless from the
north, an infusion of more recent and therefore stronger
forms ; while, perhaps impelled by the rivalry of these
.stronger forms, the weaker have blossomed, as it were,
into the richness and variety which so eminently
characterise the animal products of Central and South
America. I make no attempt to connect these changes
with geological events, but they will doubtless one day
be explained geologically. It is not difficult to conceive
that North America was once inhabited by the ancestors
of a large proportion of the present Neotropical fauna,
and that the latter was wholly, or almost wholly, thrust
forth — perhaps by glacial action, perhaps by the incur-
sion of stronger forms from Asia. The small admixture
of Neotropical forms that now occur in North America
may have been surviviors of this period of stress, or they
may be the descendants of the more ancient forms
resuming their lost inheritance. Beyond the fact that
these few Neotropical forms continue to exist in North
America, its fauna seems to be in a broad sense insepar-
able from that of the Palsearctic area, and, in my belief,
is not to be separated from it. The most difficult
problems are those connected with the Ethiopian and
Indian (which Mr. Wallace calls the Oriental) areas ; but

ZOOLOGICAL REGIONS 185

I suppose we must regard them as offshoots from a
somewhat earlier condition of the great northern or

o

' Holarctic " fauna, and as such to represent a state of
things that once existed in Europe and the greater part
of Asia. To pursue this subject — one of most pleasing
speculation — would now be impossible. I pray you to
pardon my prolixity, and I have done.*

* Presidential Address to Biological Section, British Association,
Manchester, 1887.

CHAPTER XI

GILBERT WHITE AND OTHERS

IF it can be said that Newton's life was influenced
more by any one man than by another, that man was
unquestionably Gilbert White, of Selborne. We have
his word for it that he had the greatest admiration for
White from his very boyhood, and in his " Journal," of
June 26, 1844, he records the fact that " To-day is the
anniversary of the death of Gilbert White, 1793 ' -a boy
of fifteen does not lightly take notice of an event of that
kind. To use a somewhat old-fashioned and, perhaps,
out-of-date expression, both were of " gentle birth," and
he often quoted and commented on Gilbert White's
expression in one of his letters to Robert Marsham, ''' I
was born and bred a gentleman and hope I may be
allowed to die such."

The smallest detail connected with the life and
writings of Gilbert White always had the deepest interest
for Newton, and he never lost an opportunity of adding
to the meagre facts recorded. During many years before
its publication in 1877 he assisted in the preparation, and
read all the proofs, of the edition of " Selborne " edited
by Professor Thomas Bell, F.R.S. That edition con-
tained nearly a hundred letters of Gilbert White which
had never been published before, and was thus im-
measurably superior to previous editions, but Bell
had made a somewhat perfunctory use of the mass of
material lent him by White's descendants. Newton was
especially disappointed that so little information was
recorded of White's brothers, Thomas, Benjamin, and

186

BELL'S EDITION OF " SELBORNE ' 187

John ; the last was chaplain at Gibraltar, of which place
he wrote a zoology that was never printed, and was for
many years a correspondent of Linnaeus. Another
blemish, to Newton's mind, on the book was the omission,
due to what he considered Professor Bell's " prudery," of
many interesting letters. The language of the eighteenth
century was somewhat more free than that of the nine-
teenth, and though White never used expressions which
could be called coarse even by the most fastidious, he
spoke and wrote openly and naturally in the manner of his
time. In spite of protests, Professor Bell omitted many
quaint and even amusing passages, lest they should bring
a blush to the cheek of the young lady of his day.

Old Bell has at last brought out his Edn. of " Gilbert
White," the second volume of which contains some
charming letters and shows him to have been (what I
always suspected he was) a naturalist Mr. Pepys. But
Bell has been foolishly prudish, and because there were
certain expressions rather broader than are nowadays
used he cut them out unsparingly. E.g. — there was a
certain Dr. Chandler, a friend of White's, who being on
the Continent at the outbreak of the French Revolution,
was driven from pillar to post, but at length with his
wife took refuge at Selborne. The first thing the good
lady did was to be brought to bed, and dear old G.W.
writes to a friend on the event that the Dr. was infinitely
diverted because he could not determine in which
country of Europe his infant was begotten. This Bell
has struck out. I saw the passage in the proof, and
begged it might remain ; but to no purpose. The same
with a passage in which White, describing the effects of
an exceeding cold winter and protracted spring, observes
of his attenuated haystacks that it would have been
creditable to the last two young ladies he married to
their swains had their waists been as thin ! This
prudery is disgusting.*

* Letter to Lord Lilford, February 10, 1878.

188 GILBERT WHITE AND OTHERS

Later, in answer to a question of Mr. Holt White as to
the publication of certain passages in the letters of John
Mulso, Gilbert White's contemporary and lifelong friend,
he expressed himself to much the same effect :-

Far be it from me to say what the owner of these
letters should or should not print ; of course, I know that
men will wrrite many things that should not be printed.
I protested most vehemently (only alas ! too late)
against certain passages that Wheatly printed for the
first time in his Edition of Pepys, which render it im-
possible to leave about the volume that contains them.
But in my opinion there is nothing in Mulso's letters that
might not appear ; there are expressions showing a
coarse mind, which I am sure was in great contrast to
Gilbert White's, but nothing worse, and if it is said that
certain passages have been suppressed people will put a
harsher construction on Mulso's character than they
would if the passages were in evidence. More than that
they will wonder how Gilbert White could live in affec-
tionate friendship with such a man, so thai; his character
suffers also. Puris omnia pura is a good motto, and if
one did not believe in it one has no business to teach
Zoology.

No doubt that people in the 18th century did things
openly that they are now ashamed of doing, and also
that ideas of what a parson might or might not do were
then very different from what they are at the present
day ; but I greatly doubt our being better than our fore-
fathers, who did not brag of their virtues as we do ;
indeed, I should think that Pharisaism had greatly in-
creased in the last fifty years.*

There were other editions of Gilbert White's book for
which Newton could find no good words to say, and
among the worst offenders was the late Mr. Grant Allen.

. . . The death of the editor, which almost coincided

* Letter to R. Holt-White, November 17, 1906.

GRANT ALLEN'S EDITION 189

with the issue of the book, makes the reviewer's task
peculiarly ungrateful, since with the greatest respect for
Mr. Allen, it must be deliberately said that if there were
a work off which he ought to have kept his hands it was
the "Natural History of Selborne." How little he
could understand the author, or enter into his feelings,
and it will be admitted that no man can properly edit a
book without being imbued by its spirit, may be seen by
a passage in his Introduction (p. xxxi) where, wholly
unmindful of what is shown by the work itself or the
portions of the author's correspondence printed by Bell,
Gilbert White is represented as settling down at Sel-
borne " to a placid bachelor existence," and " being a
celibate Fellow " (how many Fellows were there in those
days, and for long after, who were not celibate ?) "he
gave himself up almost entirely to his favourate fad of
watching the beasts and birds of his native country." If
a word could be found to raise a feeling of disgust among
the thousands of admirers of Gilbert White, it is that
which is above italicised. Who but a vulgarian could
conceive of White's lifelong devotion to the study of
Natural History being designated a " fad " ? And yet
Mr. Allen wrote himself a naturalist ! How much he
knew of the methods of observing naturalists in general,
and of White's in particular, is shown by another passage
in the same Introduction (p. xxxiii). Describing the
lawn and garden at Selborne, this editor is pleased to
say : ' Here the easy-minded Fellow of Oriel and curate
of Faringdon could sit in his rustic chair all day long, and
observe the birds and beasts as they dropped in to visit
him." What the fellowship and curacy have to do with
the matter is not apparent, but had Mr. Allen any ex-
perience of observational natural history, he would have
known that beasts and birds do not " drop in " to visit
people sitting all day long in chairs, rustic or otherwise ;
while he must have read Gilbert White's writings to very
little purpose to think that was the way in which the
observations, so inimitably recorded, were taken. There
is hardly a bit of armchair work in the whole of them. . . .

190 GILBERT WHITE AND OTHERS

Grant Allen's edition contained the marginal notes
made by Samuel Taylor Coleridge in his own copy of the
book. ' These Marginalia are sixteen in number, and
by how much the world is better for their publica-
tion it is not easy to say, since anything more inane
and commonplace than most of them cannot well be
imagined." Newton sarcastically suggested the issue of
a supplement to the New English Dictionary to contain
what Mr. Allen called Coleridge's " certain yet hitherto
unknown etymology " of the word gossamer, as " God's
Dame's Hair," which illustrates the old notion well
expressed by the saying of an expert, that " the less
authority there is for any derivation the more glorious
is the guess ! " (W. W. Skeat in litt. ad hoc}.

Another edition of Selborne which appeared at about
the same time was that of Dr. Richard Bowdler Sharpe,
with ten pages of introduction by the Dean of Rochester,
' a part of the performance which may be dismissed with
the remark that more than half of it would serve as a
prelude to almost any kind of book." One of the worst
features of that edition is that it contains imaginary
portraits of Gilbert White, of whom one of the best
known personal facts is that he would never sit for his
portrait. This roused Newton's just anger, and he de-
scribed the figures as " offensive impertinences," and —

as such they will properly be resented by all lovers of his
memory. Moreover they all express one and the same
falsification, proving the draughtsman's ignorance of his
victim's personal appearance. In every one Gilbert
White is represented as " wearing his own hair," to use
the old phrase. Yet we have undoubted proof that he
always wore a wig, as did nearly all the respectable
gentlemen of his day. In 1752 we find him paying forty-
five shillings for a ' feather top'd grizzle wig ' from
London; and in 1783 his niece wrote to him from

OTHER EDITIONS 191

London, " Mr. Grimble has sent your wig," while the
humorous lines, ascribed to him by Bell —

Ye worthy friends in Abchurch Lane,

Who do our noddles thatch,
Send me a wig, but not too big,

With care and with despatch, —

which are said to have formed one of his orders, tell of
this wig-wearing as a constant habit. However these
objectionable caricatures may suit some debased tastes,
they represent him as something between a clerical fop
and a fool. ... It may be added that all are equally
false and equally vulgar. *

Though Newton never edited " Selborne " himself —
there is, indeed, no reason to suppose that he even con-
templated doing so — he spared no time and pains in
helping others who were writing about White or in
trying to add to our knowledge of the naturalist or to
explain doubtful points in his notes and letters. His
article on Gilbert White written for the " Dictionary of
National Biography " contains a large amount of informa-
tion which was at that time unknown. This was to a
great extent due to the help he received from Mr.
Rashleigh Holt- White, the living head of White's family,
who was at that time preparing the life of his great-
grand-uncle, and was in possession of all the family
papers. This article contains Newton's considered
opinion of Gilbert White as a naturalist, and as it was
too long to be printed completely in the published volume,
a part of it may be quoted here.

That White's " Selborne " is the only work on natural
history which has attained the rank of an English classic
is admitted by general acclamation, as well as by com-
petent critics, and numerous have been the attempts to
discover the secret of its ever-growing reputation.
Scarcely two of them agree, and no explanation whatever

* Macmillan's Magazine, July, 1900.

192 GILBERT WHITE AND OTHERS

offered of the charm which invests it can be accepted as
in itself satisfactory. If we grant what is partially true,
that it was the first book of its kind to appear in this
country, and therefore had no rivals to encounter before
its reputation was established, we find that alone in-
sufficient to account for the way in which it is still
welcomed by thousands of readers, to many of whom —
and this especially applies to its American admirers—
scarcely a plant or an animal mentioned in it is familiar,
or even known but by name. Goldsmith's " Animated
Nature ' was begun in 1769, two years after the com-
mencement of White's correspondence with Pennant
and in the very year in which White first wrote to Bar-
rington. That book appeared in 1774, when the corre-
spondence was all but concluded and the monographs
were ready for the Royal Society. One author could not
have been influenced by the other. Goldsmith's work
was one of the most profitable of his literary under-
takings, and was at once popular beyond anything of the
kind before published ; but no one reads it now, and,
what is more, no one could conscientiously edit it without
having to add notes that would expose the author to
ridicule on one point after another. He could only
translate and travesty Buft'on, and the man who on so
many subjects "wrote like an angel" could not touch
the works of Nature without deforming them. Yet none
can deny there is a charm, an old-fashioned fragrance
even, in Goldsmith's " Animated Nature," the only work
of that age with which White's can be compared. But
taking the latter 's " Selborne," of the hundreds of state-
ments therein recorded, the number which are un-
doubtedly mistaken may be counted almost on the
fingers of one hand. The gravest is perhaps that on the
formation of honeydew (Letter Ixiv. to Barrington) ; but
it was not until some years later that the nature of that
substance was discovered in this country by Curtis
(Trans. Linn. Soc., vi. 75-91), and was not made known
until nearly a twelvemonth after its discoverer's death ;
while we have editor after editor, many of them

GILBERT WHITE'S GREATNESS 193

well-informed or otherwise competent judges, citing fresh
proofs of White's industry and accuracy. That he was
a prince among observers, nearly always observing the
right thing in the right way, is a very great merit ; but
not a few others have been as industrious and as accurate
without attaining the rank assigned to him. Good-
natured reviewers are apt to say of almost any new book
on observational natural history that the author has
studied in White's school, and to prophesy the success of
a work which they declare has been written on the model
of " Selborne." Such an author has frequently the gift
of writing agreeably, and has occasionally been a fair
naturalist, though too often there is a tendency to observe
the wrong thing or in the wrong way ; but the best of
these men does not come near White. He had a genius
for observing, and for placing before us in a few words
the living being he observed. That, in addition to his
excellence in this respect, he was not only all that was
meant by the old phrase " a scholar and a gentleman,"
while that he was a philosopher of no mean depth, is also
evident ; but it seems as though the combination of all
these qualities would not necessarily give him the un-
questioned superiority over all other writers in the same
field. The secret of the charm of his writings must be
sought elsewhere ; but it has been sought in vain.
Some have ascribed it to his way of identifying himself
in feeling with the animal kingdom, though to this sym-
pathy there were notable exceptions. Some, like Lowell,
set down the " natural magic " of White to the fact that,
' open the book where you will, it takes you out of
doors ; ' but the same is to be said of other writers, who
yet remain comparatively undistinguished. It may be
certainly averred that his style, a certain stiffness
characteristic of the period being admitted, is eminently
unaffected, even when he is " Didactic," as he more than
once apologises for becoming, and the same simplicity is
as observable in his letters to members of his family,
which could never have been penned with the view of
publication, and have never been retouched, as in those

194 GILBERT WHITE AND OTHERS

which he addressed to his stately correspondents,
Pennant and Barrington, for use in their works. Then,
too, there is the complete absence of self -importance
or self-consciousness. The observation or the remark
stands on its own merits, and gains nothing because he
happens to be the maker of it, except it be in the tinge of
humour that often delicately pervades it. The beauties
of the work, apart from the way in which they directly
appeal to naturalists, as they did to Darwin, grow upon
the reader who is not a naturalist, as Lowell testifies, and
the more they are studied the more they seem to defeat
analysis.

Mr. Holt- White's help in the article for the " Dic-
tionary of National Biography ' was amply repaid by
Newton, when the former was writing his ' Life and
Letters of Gilbert White." As recorded in the Preface,
' To Professor Newton, my obligations are many and
great. In addition to much valuable advice, he has been
good enough to send me the natural history notes which
appear with his initials." After a visit which Mr. Holt-
White paid to him at Magdalene at that time, he wrote :-

Needless to say that your visit gave me much
pleasure, and I hope that it may not be your last. I
look on the entertainment of you as a duty to G.W.,
from whom I have derived more advantage than from
any other naturalist, and it would take a long while to
pay off that debt.

He took exception to the description in the Preface
of White as " remaining single " : —

I think ' a bachelor " or " unmarried ' would be
better than " single," which seems to imply singularity,
and I being in that condition demur to such an impli-
cation ! Some people seem to forget that we are all
born ' single," barring, as the Irish would say, twins
of both sexes — so that it is the natural unsophisticated

THE "MOLLY LETTERS 195

state of man. For the rest, there is really nothing to
remark upon. It appears to be as good as good can be.
The Shakespearean quotation is very happy, and alto-
gether it is what Gr.W. and his contemporaries would
have called an " elegant piece." But I must not omit
expressing to you my thanks for so kindly and fully
acknowledging such services as I have been able to render
to you, services which I must say it has given me very
great pleasure to afford — if only in regard to the debt
I incurred through your valuable assistance, when I was
writing the article for the " Dictionary of National
Biography."

It was not only on matters of Natural History that
his advice was sought, but on questions also of the
publication or otherwise of more personal letters : —

Now I come to the ' Molly ' letters, about the
advisability of printing which you asked my opinion.
I have read them attentively and am come to the con-
clusion that, owing to my bias, my opinion on the
subject is worth nothing ! I do so dread the notion
that many persons, not at all adverse critics, might
think that one could have too much even of Gilbert
White ! I think before printing them in extenso you
ought to consult some one else, who would be a fairer
judge than myself. I am afraid people would resent
the solicitude with which the writer regularly orders
codfish and desires his brother to draw the interest of
the Long Annuities ! Yet in most of the letters there
is a playful tone, which to me is highly diverting and
agreeable. Extracts might certainly be printed without
any doubt, but the making of them would require very
careful selection, and that by a competent man. I
wish I knew one to recommend, but I must plainly say
that I don't. If you should find a competent judge to
say " print the whole," I should be only too glad, but
it is what I dare not trust myself to say — because I
know myself to be such a strong partizan — whiter than
the whitest of Whitists. I can't put it more concisely.

196 GILBERT WHITE AND OTHEES

The " Molly ' letters, with a few exceptions, were
included in the ' Life," which was published in two
volumes in 1901.

I think you will like G. White's " Life."* It ought to
have been, and might perfectly well have been, got into
one volume, and there are a few (very few) blemishes
in it. People ought to buy it, but I suppose the public
which takes I don't know how many thousand copies of
an " Englishwoman's Love-Letters ' will not have it.
The book is too matter-of-fact for "gush," and as to
the reviewers they know nothing of the " inwardness '
of " Selborne," and in their ignorance make absolute
fools of themselves, when criticising this book.f

Newton had little fault to find with the substance
of the book, but the covers were adorned with a Swallow
unlike any bird known to naturalists, which drew lamen-
tations from him :—

The green binding reminds me of the Willow Wren
and is therefore very appropriate, but why, oh why did
not Mr. Murray get somebody who knew what a Swallow
was to design the figure on the back ? They are carica-
tures of that blessed bird, as terrible to behold as those of
G.W. in another edition ! And a Swallow is such a
lovely bird !

And later on : —

If the Swallows on your binding were strictly con-
ventional, I should not mind them. The Swallows on a
plate don't spoil my dinner, but your binders have
attempted realistic Swallows and have disgracefully
failed. The designer (I will not call him draughtsman
even) ought to have a dozen or two thrust down his
throat. That would be an " object lesson ' teaching
him what a bad swallow means.

* "The Life and Letters of Gilbert White." By Raahleigh Holt-
White. Two vols., London, 1901.

f Letter to Thomas Southwell. July 3. 1901.

MULSO'S LETTERS 197

In the course of his preparation of the article for
the "Dictionary of National Biography" Newton had the
opportunity of reading the letters to Gilbert White of
John Mulso, who was White's intimate friend and corre-
spondent during more than forty years. Unfortunately,
Mulso or his descendants had destroyed Gilbert White's
letters to him, but his own letters are full of interesting
observations and throw much light on the life and
character of his friend They are now in the possession
of a collateral descendant of Gilbert White, the Earl of
Stamford, whose father, the late Earl, lent them to
Newton.

Magdalene College,

June 13, 1898.

DEAR LORD STAMFORD,

... I cannot refrain from expressing to you
the extreme gratification that the opportunity of examin-
ing these volumes * has given me. Though my hopes
had been high, their fulfilment far exceeded any antici-
pation, and it is very long since anything so interesting
has passed into my hands, while I can but wonder that
these papers have remained so long unpublished. I
desire to offer you my most sincere thanks for the
pleasure I have derived from the reading of these letters,
to say nothing of the wonderful light which they reflect
upon Gilbert White's life, and their consequent utility
to me in the task I have undertaken. Though I cer-
tainly had not hitherto neglected any means of inform-
ing myself concerning him, I feel that he had been a
man comparatively unknown to me. I read through all
the letters, some of them several times, and there are
many which I should like to read again. I earnestly
hope they may be soon printed, and just as they stand,
though there are a few coarse passages. One does not
leave them with an exalted opinion of the writer, but
there is nothing to affect the estimable character of Gilbert

* 4i Mulso's Letters."

108 GILBERT WHITE AND OTHERS

White who, it is evident, not unfrequently must have
administered a reproof to his correspondent, and that is
possibly a reason why his own letters have disappeared.

Yours very faithfully,

ALFRED NEWTON.

Lord Stamford and Mr. Holt- White eventually
decided to publish Mulso's letters, and Newton's advice
was again sought as to what should or should not be
printed.

When the book appeared in the following spring, it
gave Newton profound pleasure to find that the volume
was dedicated to himself, a compliment which he
acknowledged in the following letter.

March 20, 1907.

MY DEAR HOLT- WHITE,

I have just received the precious volume and
was congratulating myself on its neat and trim appear-
ance— thinking how easy it would be to convey the like
congratulations to you, when it opened of its own
accord immediately after the title-page, and the Dedica-
tion was in full view. This alters the case, and now my
duty is more than doubled. It is most kind of you and
your noble cousin to have thought of me in this con-
nection—yet if an almost unbounded reverence for the
character and especially the example of your great-
grand-uncle gives a man a claim to that distinction,
then your selection of me is justified — for I doubt whether
any one has ever entertained so strong a feeling towards
Gilbert White as I have from iny very boyhood.

Be assured that I consider this one of the prettiest
compliments that have ever been paid to me, and be-
lieve me with the sincerest thanks,

Yours very truly,

ALFRED NEWTON.

It may truly be said that Gilbert White was one of
the very last interests in Newton's life. Only a few days

THOMAS BEWICK 199

before iris death, writing to a correspondent who had
asked him where White had been born, he replied :-

There is Gilbert White's own authority for his having
been born at Selborne Vicarage. In one of his poems
he has : —

" Nor be the Parsonage by the Muse forgot,
The partial bard admires his native spot."

I believe I was the first to point this out.

So far as is known, he visited Selborne once only,
in 1874.

Last week I went on a pilgrimage with A. C. Smith
to Selborne, and was charmed with the beauty of the
place. Unluckily, old Bell was not at home.

It is worth recording that he possessed Yarrell's copy
of the first edition of " Selborne," and Gilbert White's
copy of Ray's " Pisces."

Hardly inferior (in Newton's opinion) to Gilbert
White in having a lasting influence on British Ornith-
ology was Thomas Bewick, whose ' Land Birds ' ap-
peared in 1797, the " Water Birds " in 1804.

Now there is really a chance for you, the long ex-
pected autobiography of Bewick is published. Sit
down and write us a notice of it for the Ibis ; surely you
can knock off sixteen of our little pages on a subject
which must interest you as a Northumbrian, an ornith-
ologist, and an admirer of all true men ? I should think
Bewick has done more to instil Ornithology in boys'
hearts than ' any other man," not excepting Gilbert
White, for there is many a lively lad who has been
attracted by those wonderful wood-cuts, which at once
appealed to his senses, and who would never have had
the patience even to skim over "Selborne." You are
the man to do it, you live on the spot, have talked with
dozens of people who knew the old fellow well, and must
have lots to say about him, of your own picking up.

200 GILBERT WHITE AND OTHERS

Pray now, set to work, or else when you come to Cam-
bridge look out for squalls. I shall most assuredly put
every local member of the B.O.U. up to sending you to
Coventry or Corinth, I mean the city of the seceders,
not of the two seas, or some other very disagreeable
place if you do not.*

Of the older naturalists Newton had the greatest
reverence for Willughby and Ray, of whom he wrote
(" Dictionary of Birds," p. 7) :—

The foundation of scientific Ornithology was laid
by the joint labours of Francis Willughby (born 1635,
died 1672) and John Ray (born 1628, died 1705), for it
is impossible to separate their share of work in Natural
History more than to say that, while the former more
especially devoted himself to Zoology, Botany was the
favourite pursuit of the latter. Together they studied,
together they travelled, and together they collected.
Willughby, the younger of the two, and at first the
other's pupil, seems to have gradually become the master,
but dying before the promise of his life was fulfilled, his
writings were given to the world by his friend Ray, who,
adding to them from his own stores, published the
' Ornithologia " in Latin in 1676, and in English with
many emendations in 1678.

Writing (April 24, 1906) to Mr. T. Whitaker, who was
then preparing his " Birds of Nottinghamshire," Newton
reminded him to pay tribute to the memory of Willughby.

There is, however, a much greater Nottinghamshire
ornithologist [than Wolley] of whom you should give
some account, and that is Francis Willughby of Wollaton
(born 1635, died 1672), to whom justice, I think, has
never been done, nor has his life been properly written ;
for he was so overshadowed by his friend Ray, who was
his senior by a few years only, but survived him and saw
to the publication of his " Birds " and " Fishes."

* Letter to H. B. Tristram, July 3, 1862.

RAY, WILLUGHBY, GOULD 201

. . . Anyhow in your book you must not neglect
Willughby — the earliest ornithologist in England after
Turner.

When the " Willughby Society ' ' was established in
1879, Newton with Osbert Salvin and Dr. P. L. Sclater
formed the committee of selection. The object of the
society was the reprinting of rare ornithological works,
and in return for an annual subscription of one pound
the members received a copy of each of the reprints.
The first to be produced was TunstalPs " Ornithologia
Britannica " ; this was followed by Sir Andrew Smith's
paper in the South African Journal, Reports of his
Exploring Expedition, and other rare works. Un-
fortunately some trouble arose between Mr. Tegetmeier,
the Director of the Society, and a lady copyist, with the
result that the Society came to an untimely end.

Of the ornithologists of the middle of the nineteenth
century probably the most widely known was Mr. J.
Gould, whose " Birds of Europe " and ' Monograph of
the Humming-birds " and countless other volumes were
eagerly bought. The books were popular on account
of the coloured illustrations, which were better than any-
thing of the kind produced up to that time, but it does
not appear that Gould was himself a very serious
ornithologist.

By the way, Gould always sends me his ' ' Birds of
Great Britain ' to look over for him, and the utter
ignorance they sometimes betray is amazing. He has
no personal knowledge of any English birds, except
those found between Eton and Maidenhead, and about
these species he fancies no one else knows anything.
It is most amusing to see how anxious he is to avoid
committing himself about Darwin's theory. Of course,
he does not care a rap whether it is true or not — but he
is dreadfully afraid that by prematurely espousing it

202 GILBERT WHITE AND OTHERS

he might lose some subscribers, though he acknowledged
to me the other day he thought it would be generally
adopted before long.*

Another very popular naturalist of a rather later
period than Gould was Mr. Frank Buckland.

I am afraid I know of no one who could help you in
your Trout inquiries. I never had any taste for fishing
and have no piscatorial or ichthyological correspondents,
though I fully appreciate the interest of your observa-
tions. It is a pity that Day published them in such a
place as Land and Water and gave that ignorant fellow
Frank Buckland the opportunity of introducing them.
By the way, I see from Saturday's No. that he has just
become aware of the existence of Bacteria — which he
calls " brutes ! " f

The expression quoted in the letter above was less
than fair, for however little of a scientific man Buckland
may have been — and that was owing to his lack of a
scientific training — there have been few people during
the last fifty years who have done more than he did to
encourage the study of Natural History in this country.
He was always on friendly terms with Newton, who
wrote of him afterwards : ' . . . Buckland, for whom
personally I had much regard. His great mistake was
that he believed people when they told him he was a
naturalist, while he was wanting in every essential of a
naturalist, except zeal."

Thomas Edwards, the " self-made ' naturalist of
Banff, whose life was written by Smiles, corresponded
frequently in the 'forties and 'fifties with Newton,
who often spoke of him with affection. Mr. Harvie-
Brown proposed to put a portrait of Edwards with those
of others on the title-page of his " Fauna of the Moray
Basin."

* Letter to Edward Newton, April 25, 1864.
t Letter to J. A. Harvie-Brown, May 10, 1880.

EDWARDS, JEFFER1ES 203

Your proposed medallion title-page is a very good
idea, and 1 would submit that you should put old Thomas
Edwards among those you may please to honour. I
have got a good many of his letters written to me in the
'fifties. I don't know whether you would care to
have them, but if so they are at your service, and I
think I could lay hand on them without much trouble.

Smiles made such a ridiculous mess of his Memoir of
him, that I should be glad to see a proper notice of the
old man's services inserted, such an one as I am sure
you would write. His enthusiasm led him into several
egregious misstatements (to put the matter mildly)
which it is hard to overlook ; nevertheless the man was
without doubt a born naturalist, and did a little good in
the bird and beast way. I think he is worthy of a place
alongside of St. John and Gordon, to say nothing of
Thornton.*

Newton's opinion of Richard JefEeries, whose books
achieved a considerable popularity at one time, was not
a favourable one. Considering him as a scientific man,
Newton was right, for Jeft'eries' books contained many
inaccuracies and no original observations. The novels
did not add greatly to his reputation.

You must go elsewhere for details of Jefieries.
Several books have been written about him. He was
an unhappy man, with bad health and a genius for
' word painting," which took with the public. He tried
to write novels, but they were invariably scouted ; yet
such is the ignorance of people in regard to Natural
History that his books about animals were read with
rapture, though they were every bit as bad as his novels.
The greater part of the poor wretch's life was spent in
abject misery, as he was too proud to let his friends
know that he often had not enough to eat ; at least so
I have heard say. I believe at the last he was better oft',
but then it was too late. I regard the poor man with

* Letter to J. A. Harvie-Brown, February 11, 1892.

204 GILBERT WHITE AND OTHERS

\

great commiseration, but there is an utterly false tone
(as it seems to me) in all his writings.*

Another naturalist of the same period, with whom
Newton came much into contact, but of a different
quality from some of those others already mentioned,
was Mr. Henry Seebohm, who had made a considerable
fortune at Sheffield, and late in life devoted his energies
to Ornithology. He made two journeys to Siberia, in
1875 with Mr. Harvie-Brown, and in 1877 alone, and
published two volumes describing his voyages and dis-
coveries. Newton's first meeting with him was in 1877,
when he went to Sheffield to see Seebohm's collection of
eggs.

Early in December I took train to Sheffield and
gratified my eyes with the spoils which the adventurous
Seebohm reaped in Siberia. And very great they are
for an Arctic harvest, interrupted as it was by two ship-
wrecks in the river Yenesei. Each of these disasters
cost him a week's diversion from his proper pursuits,
and occurring, as they did, in the height of the short
summer, they seriously crippled his operations. On the
whole he thinks himself fortunate in saving what he had
got, and save it he did, every egg-shell. That is a
wonderful man, and it is a pity he is so very rough in
his ways. I take it he will prove himself a leader now
that he is fairly come to the front. At the Zool. Soc.
one evening he described his expedition in a way better
than anything I have ever heard there before ; just saying
the right thing, neither too much nor too little, and
keeping up the interest of his audience (a good one) for
a whole hour most admirably and without the slightest
apparent effort. Huxley, who heard him somewhere
else, is said to have pronounced him a born lecturer ;
and he ought to know the necessary qualifications if
any one does.f

* Letter to G. E. H. Barrett-Hamilton, September 12, 1904.
t Letter to Lord Lilford, January 7, 1878.

HENRY SEEBOHM 205

If Seebohm had been content with his fine record as
a traveller and collector, all would have been well, but
he ventured without a sufficient equipment into the
thorny questions of classification, and, after perpetrating
some rather glaring inaccuracies, he inevitably fell foul
of Newton.

It is not so much that Seebohm is no scholar, but it
is his way of making reckless assertions that is so repre-
hensible. You may remember in the Ibis for July last
he launched out into a tirade against people in general
for having neglected JPallas's " Zoographia," concerning
which he propounded a long story absolutely without
truth and (as I cannot but believe) wholly of his own
invention. When I told him, as I did privately, how
the matter stood, and lent him Von Baer's report (of
which he had never heard), he made a most shuffling
attempt in the next number to get out of the scrape.
It is no part of my business to set other people right or
show up their " blunders " (his own favourite word), so
long as they keep clear of me ; and as this matter did
not in any way concern me, I let him alone. When,
however, it came to a fresh attack on me based on a
mare's nest discovery, I thought it time to notice it.*

He is a man who, having made a lot of money at
Sheffield, has retired from business, and taken up
Ornithology. He has great force of character and is a
fluent speaker, qualities which have helped him in the
world and dispose some people to think him a great man.
But his writings show him not to be clear-headed or
logical. I knew him to be shallow and ignorant as
regards Ornithological literature, but until last week 1
had given him credit for knowing birds when he saw
them. To my great surprise my eyes were opened. I
was going to London, and, just before starting, there
arrived a small box of bird skins from Portugal which
the sender asked me to determine for him. As I knew

* Letter to CoJ. H. W. Feilden, March 16, 1883.

206 GILBERT WHITE AND OTHERS

the species were all SylviidcB, in which family, as you
are aware, Mr. Seebohm has attained great critical
reputation, I thought I would take them with me to
town, open the box there and compare them with his
series, which I had not seen for several years. To my
infinite amazement I found that he could not recognise
some of our commonest English birds. He insisted on
a common Sedge- Warbler being a Reed-Wren, and
notwithstanding the wonderful rules he has laid down
for infallibly distinguishing the Willow- Wren and the
ChifEchafE he was no better than anybody else in deter-
mining them, when it came to actual specimens.*

In spite of the hard things which Newton wrote of
Seebohm, they continued perfectly friendly until the
death of the latter in 1895.

* Letter to Rev. A. C. Smith, November 30, 1883.

CHAPTER XII

METHODS OF WORK

IT will have become apparent to the reader who has
followed these pages so far that Newton was an earnest
seeker after the truth in all things, and, so far as it was
humanly possible, he was never satisfied with anything
less than the completest accuracy. From quite early
days he was constantly receiving eggs from people,
who believed, in their enthusiasm, that they had
discovered some rarity, and wished for Newton's con-
firmation.

For the last thirteen days I have been wrapped in
contemplation (and a great-coat) with respect to the egg
you have entrusted to my care. ' Who steals my purse,"
etc. (vide Shakespeare). Morris cracked the shell of it,
what if I totally demolish its reputation and good name ?
I am more than ever disposed to agree with the anony-
mous reviewer in the Ibis. The office of Devil's Advo-
cate is a particularly ungracious one. I know perfectly
well that it is the habit of collectors to put their implicit
confidence in evidence on which they would refuse to
hang the veriest cur which ever merited the decoration
of the tin pot.

After a really serious and steady course of observa-
tion I have deliberately come to the conclusion that in
your egg marked Nucifraga caryocatactes I can detect no
character which may not be found in a Magpie's. At
the same time I am fain to confess, as I said in the hasty
scrawl when I last wrote, that I have not got a Magpie's
egg with which to match your pattern. In size and

20?

208 METHODS OF WORK

shape, and in colour of ground and of markings, and in
the forms of these markings I can equal it in unquestion-
able Magpie's, and this from by no means a large series.
Had I a good series, Say 500 specimens, I might possibly
find its exact double. Not that this is saying much.
But I would tell you how your argument differs from
that of Wolley's in regard to the Smew's eggs. He did
not rest satisfied with the story of the people concerned,
or even with the appearance of a stuffed Smew's skin
with " hatching spots " under her wings, the only Smew
he had ever seen in Lapland, or with the eggs before him
corresponding with what he had previously ascertained
from a really trustworthy and tried man to be their true
appearance. With all this, and even with the general
dissimilarity between the supposed " Unilo's " eggs and
the ordinary form of Wigeon's, he was not satisfied ; not
until he had discovered a minute but constant difference
which held on one side with his three Unilo's eggs and
on the other with his three hundred Wigeon's, did he
allow himself to believe that he really possessed
genuine Smew's eggs. It was this one point of evidence
of a positive nature, and about which there could be no
mistake even with closed eyes, supervening on all the
presumptive testimony which makes the case of the
Smew one so excellently proved.

Now I really think in the case of your Nutcracker's
it is by no means a statement unfavourable to your view,
to say that as far as our knowledge goes there is nothing
in the appearance of the egg to afford any evidence
against the Nucifragine theory ; but I do believe that
the fairest statement would be to put it that there is no
perceptible character in the egg which is not also possessed
by many Magpie's.*

For many years I have been trying to impress upon
people the necessity of identifying the eggs they take at
the only time and under almost the only conditions which
render identification certain. If they will not do this

* Letter to H. B. Tristram, April 25, 1860,

IDENTIFYING EGGS 209

they have no right to expect that others will be at the
trouble of making an examination which seldom leads
to a satisfactory result, and is therefore generally but a
waste of time. In ordinary circumstances it surely may
be looked for that a man when he has found a suspicious
nest should lay himself out to see the owner, and if he
cannot do that satisfactorily he should refrain from
taking the eggs. It is notorious that this is absolutely
necessary in the case of Ducks' nests, and the subsequent
examination of the down is a very poor substitute for
the evidence that the finders may in most cases with a
moderate amount of prudence obtain on the spot. The
cases when this cannot possibly be done are compara-
tively rare.*

In 1906 two young ornithologists found the Scaup
Duck breeding in the Hebrides and presented Newton
with eggs for the Cambridge Museum He wished to
include a record of the find in the " Ootheca Wolleyana,"
but in spite of the most careful observations of the bird
made by the finders of the nest, he was unwilling to admit
the authenticity of the eggs without a further identifica-
tion of the down : —

Hurrah ! Victoria ! ! Hallelujah ! ! ! Banzai ! ! ! !
Hooroosh ! ! ! ! ! I must express my exultation in
many languages.

Yesterday I placed in Gadow's hands six glass-topped
boxes containing down of (1) Eider-Duck ; (2 and 3),
Black and Velvet Scoter ; (4) Dun-Bird ; (5) Tufted
Duck, and (6) Kinnear's Hebrides nest of 11/6/06.
To-day Gadow brought me a lock or " spray " of each
between two slips of glass, and I waited with all the
patience I could muster for the verdict. The Hebrides'
down would not match any of the foregoing. Then, for
the first time, I produced your little packet of Scaup's
down from Sutherland and he put a lock of it between

* Letter to J. A. Harvie-Browii. December 2, 1886.

P

210 METHODS OF WOKK

two other glass slips, immediately exclaiming ' That is
the same as the Hebrides specimen ! ' Can anything
be better ? You will observe that this investigation (if
so it may be called) was carried on with the utmost
fairness. All he knew was that 1 wanted, if possible,
to determine the " unknown quantity," i.e. the Hebrides
down. I was careful not to give the slightest indication
of what I should like the result to be, and yet you see
it has come out exactly as I should like it to be, and all
to the credit of Kinnear, Bahr and Co. May the angels
take charge of them and their shadow never grow less.
I am so glad on their account.

You can't realize how this business has been afflicting
me, for I had made up my mind to omit Kinnear's eggs
from the " O.W." unless the down examination were
clearly in favour of their being Scaup, and I know what
a serious blow it would be to him if I did so.

Gadow, though he has no doubt on the mattter, admits
that the differences between these downs are to a great
extent beyond description ; but curiously enough the
Scaup's is distinctly darker (almost black with a whitish
centre, as they all have) than Tufted Ducks' (which is
ashy-brown) or any of the others. Anas nyroca, which
we afterwards tried, comes very near it ; but of course
that is out of the question.

In giving all these different downs to Gadow to try,
my object was, of course, not to mislead him, but to
train his eye to differences which at first sight are hardly
apparent, and no doubt it is only a trained eye that can
detect these almost minute differences. He was positive
about the Hebrides down being different to any of the
others, knowing nothing more about it than that I
wanted it determined if possible ; nor did he know when
I handed him the precious lock of Scaup's from the little
bit you sent me that I expected or thought it possible
that they should be the same.

Afterwards we put them all under a strong power
(microscope), but that did not help us much. It chiefly
showed that the old downs become brittle and lose the

THE IDENTIFIED DUCK 211

abortive booklets ; but the structure seems to be much
the same in all.*

He often quoted his old friend Hudlestone, who

' used to declare that an identified duck's was the most

valuable of eggs— in consequence of which he got the

nickname of ' The Identified Duck ' (for we valued him)

— and there is a good deal of truth in it."

When he was collecting materials for his " Bustard
in Britain " (a book that never saw the light), any refer-
ence to the bird in however obscure a book was traced,
if possible, to its source and its accuracy or otherwise
tested.

I have lately been much interested by corroborating
in a minute point the story of an old man, one Chafin,
who in 1818, being then about eighty-four years of age,
published a book on Cranbourn Chase, wherein he says
that in November, 1751, he saw and shot at near Andover
25 Bustards, and winds up by saying " In two or three
days after I set off for Cambridge " (to account for his
not renewing his attempt on their lives). A reference
to the Residence book of Emmanuel College, at which
Chafin was then an undergraduate, shows that he returned
on the 4th Nov. 1751, so that his encounter with the
Bustards would have been on the 1st or 2nd of that
month and year ! f

Questions of all kinds more or less connected with
Natural History were constantly sent to him, such as
the death-song of the Swan, the winter transformation
of the Cuckoo, the hibernation of Swallows, and so on.
One of these hardy annuals was the Great Black Wood-
pecker, which was from time to time reported as having
been seen in some part or other of Britain, but never to
Newton's satisfaction.

* Letter to J. A. Harvie-Brown. October 7, 1906.
t Letter to Col. H. W. Feilden, December 8, 1884

212 METHODS OF WORK

Picus martius seems determined to be the Sea Serpent
of British ornithologists ! He is always careful to keep
out of the way of any observer of experience, and I think
that until he does reveal himself to some one who is able
to kill him or knows him well by sight it is best not to
think too much of his supposed apparitions.*

I read in some paper of the Black Woodpecker, and
a particularly lame story I thought it. I don't believe
that Lilford ever turned out any birds of this species,
for he, if any one, well knew it needs fir woods to live in,
and there are none in his neighbourhood. Beside that
I think he never had any number in his possession (I
remember one). The tendency to construct myths is
something wonderful ! Look how many have grown up
about the Gare-fowl, and many more there will be. It
would never surprise me to read that he had the bird —
perhaps half a dozen birds — alive on one of his ponds at
Lilford ! f

On another occasion a celebrated literary personage
proclaimed his belief, accompanied by second-hand
evidence, in the well-worn legend of the mother Viper
swallowing her young.

Mr. — for aught I know may be another

Vesalius, John Hunter, or Von Baer ; but it is my mis-
fortune not to have heard of him before, so far as I
remember. There are some subjects that I never discuss,
such as Transubstantiation, Evolution, Free Trade, and
the Hibernation of Swallows. This old, old story belongs
to the same category. I have made up my mind on
each and all of them, and in respect of them when any-
body smites me on the one cheek, I hold my tongue, if
I do not quite fulfil the Christian precept of turning to
him the other also. Some years ago I most unintention-
ally got myself into a mess along of some Manx Cats,
and came in for a great amount of abuse. I at once let
those interesting animals alone, and, as I felt none the

* Letter to J. A. Harvie-Brown, December 1, 1873.
f Letter to T. Southwell, December 22, 1902.

YARRELL'S "BRITISH BIRDS' 213

worse since from doing so, I can only recommend your
following the example in respect to the Vipers. This is
really all I have to say on the subject ; when some one
is able to show by what means the process of digestion
in the mother- vipers is arrested, it may be worth talking
about, otherwise we might as well attempt to argue with
an ordinary Chinaman, who will maintain that an eclipse
is caused by the Great Dragon attacking the sun or the
moon (as the case may be) and swallowing the whole or
part of those bodies. But if you don't like lying down
and being kicked, at least do not pull me (for Heaven's
sake) into the controversy. I think you will find letting
it drop the cheapest in the end, for there is not a chance
of your convincing your opponent ; and if there were,
you may depend upon it he is not worth convincing.*

It must be admitted that in the search for truth,
and in the avoidance of inaccuracies, caution may be
carried beyond the bounds of reason. This is especially
so in a subject like the study of the birds of Great Britain,
where the increasing number of accurate observers is
constantly adding to our local knowledge. In 1871
Newton began the editing of the fourth edition of
YarrelPs " History of British Birds," the standard work
on the subject. There was an agreement made with
Mr. Van Voorst, the publisher, to the effect that the
whole book should be completed and published not later
than the year 1885. By the end of 1879 only a quarter
of the book had been produced.

I only hope Part V. will not give me so much trouble.
I have brought between two hundred and three hundred
books here to enable me to get on with it, but I cannot
say as yet that I have seriously begun, though much of
the preliminary work is done. I have also brought a
large number of skins.

By the beginning of 1882, when more than ten of the

* Letter to T. Southwell, May 13, 1891.

214 METHODS OF WORK

fourteen years had elapsed, and only a half of the book
was ready, Mr. Van Voorst quite naturally began to get
a little bit restive, and said that the copyright of ' Yar-
rell ' ' would be out before long, and that at the rate of
one part in two years no one of his generation would ever
live to see the completion of the work. Newton con-
tended that he had never made any agreement as to the
date of issue, etc., that his system of editing required an
intimate acquaintance with thousands of books and
obscure publications, and that he could not do justice
to the subject if he hastened the publication of the parts.
Mr. Van Voorst threatened legal proceedings, and event-
ually an arrangement was made to the effect that Mr.
Howard Saunders should edit the third and fourth
volumes of the book. The decision was welcomed by
the long-suffering subscribers, but it was a bitter blow
to Newton, who wrote : —

This is a terrible wrench. For more than twenty-
two years the preparation of Yarrell ' ' has been one
of the main objects of my life, and I can safely say that
no man ever devoted himself more faithfully to a task.
On the other hand, I am now free from bonds that have
held me in slavery (though you know the work has
always been fascinating) for ten years and more.*

To a man endowed with such a highly developed
faculty of sceptical criticism, as the above-quoted letters
show was the case of Newton, it might be expected that
the quickly changing schemes of nomenclature and
classification would cause, at the least, some searchings
of heart. It must therefore be recorded that, so far as
questions of classification were concerned, he always
kept an open mind and was ever ready to consider new
ideas.

With regard to a systematic arrangement of birds, I

* Letter to A. C. Smith, May 23, 1882.

CLASSIFICATION 215

am much mistaken if we are not on the verge of the
adoption of changes which a short time ago would have
astonished the most learned ornithologists, and that in
a year or two all the old ' orders ' will be entirely
broken up and new ones constructed. Prof. Huxley,
Mr. Sclater, and I, working each from different sides,
have come to something very like the same results, and
I must confess I think our results are likely to be lasting
ones. I own, therefore, I should be very sorry to see
our University pledged to maintain a systematic arrange-
ment which, unless I read the signs of the times very
wrongly, is about to be set aside for ever.*

It may be said, indeed, that he was always waiting
for the true scheme of classification, and he never adopted
one or publicly formulated one of his own so long as he
lived.

I think a fairly satisfactory arrangement (all things
considered) of British birds might be made — -beginning
with Corvidce. You may go to Buntings, Finches, and
the Larks. Then comes a break and you must start
afresh with (say) Paridce (including Nuthatch and Tree-
Creeper) and so to Sylviidce, Turdidce,Laniidce (-t-Ampelis)
and finishing with the Swallows, which so far as I can
see form the only family of Passeres about the boundaries
of which one can be sure. I believe I sent W. Eagle-
Clarke a tentative list some years ago, of which he made
use in the Edinburgh Museum, and I doubt whether I
could improve upon it now — for one is no nearer the
pedigree of British birds than one was then.f

In questions of nomenclature it must be admitted
that Newton was ultra-conservative. He founded his
faith on the Twelfth Edition of the " Systema Naturae '
of Linnaeus, and he strongly resented any attempts to
upset the old order.

* Letter to Mrs. Strickland, February 12, 1867.
t Letter to William Evana, November 20, 1898.

216 METHODS OF WORK

What you call the Martes martes " difficulty " is no
difficulty whatever to me. I follow the usage of a cen-
tury or more, and when I find it expedient to adopt a
specific form as generic I take the next oldest specific
name, and there is sure to be one at hand. This was the
invariable practice till a few years ago when these
foolish people started on " principles ' which were not
only new, but such as no man of sense or education
would take up. It has been shown that the Scomber
scomber and one or two similar cases, sometimes cited
in defence of the new theory, were probably due to care-
lessness, or want of supervision. Certain it is that in
Linnaeus' own copy of the 12th Edition of the " Syst.
Nat." which you may see in the library of the Linn.
Soc. he has crossed out scomber as a specific name, and
had his intended 13th Edition ever appeared it would
doubtless have been corrected.

It is a curious thing that the more ignorant and un-
educated a man is the more he tries to upset all estab-
lished scientific nomenclature ; but it has happened
that a few educated men have (from vanity ?) done
some mischief in the same direction, and they are greedily
followed by the unlearned, who fancy themselves wiser
than all the rest of the world.*

Certainly 'comparative" names are objectionable,
except the time-honoured major and minor. One
objection is (and it applies even to these two words)
that when one is bestowed, another species is so apt
to turn up which renders it inapplicable. I think
nothing is more abominable than naming animals after
men or women, and of late the practice (which shows
that the nomenclator is ignorant or idle, perhaps both)
has been so followed that it is almost an insult for any
person to be so " commemorated."

As to generic names, it has been reduced to an
absurdity. What do you think of Thonarsitorson as
the generic name of a dove, given by Bonaparte in his

* Letter to G. E. H. Barrett-Hamilton, June 30, 1904.

NOMENCLATURE 217

later and semi-insane condition ? and according to
Reichenbach the species stands as Thonarsitorson dupetil-
thonarsei ! (see Cat. B. Br. Mus., xxi. p. 90). I would
sooner be a Scomber scomber. One of the most beautiful
birds of the Sandwich Islands bears the joint names of
two of the biggest rascals that ever landed upon them.*

The practice of putting a small initial letter to a
specific name originated, it seems, with Strickland, and
for a long while indicated that whoever followed the
practice accepted (at least in spirit) the British Association
Rules for Nomenclature. Linnaeus himself never called
any animal (but only plants) after a man or woman, and
his practice was to write a substantive with a capital
letter and an adjective with a small one. A great many
people failed to see the difference and so confusion
arose. f

With the comparatively recent practice of describing
sub-species and the introduction of trinomials, Newton
could never bring himself to agree. Doubtless the
enthusiasm of some of the modern naturalists outran
their discretion, but it is impossible for the working
zoologist to do without the use of trinomials altogether,
and one cannot suppose that in the course of time
Newton would not have seen the necessity himself.

Finsch wrote to tell me of Hartert having made some
thirty or more subspecies of Alauda cristata, and now I
hear of nine of Loxia curvirostra.

If I had not so much on my hands I think I should
do what might save future ornithologists a good deal of
trouble. You know that England and Wales have fifty-
two counties between them ; two of them, Rutland and
Middlesex, are ornithologically speaking of small account
and may be safely neglected, though the County Council
of Middlesex thinks not a little of its capabilities and

* Letter to G. E. H. Barrett-Hamilton, October 12, 1898.
t Letter to William Evans, November 21, 1898.

218 METHODS OF WORK

sternly prohibits the taking of Ospreys', Bearded Tit-
mouse's, and various eggs within its limits. Well, then,
you have in South Britain fifty counties — for I don't
propose to deal with N.B., where the more philosophical
boundaries of watersheds have been successfully intro-
duced—and I propose to take some common bird such
as Fringilla coslebs or Emberiza citrinella, or both, and
divide each into fifty sub-species ; thus : E. citrinella
northumbriensis ; E. citrinella dunelmensis ; E. citrinella
eboracensis, lincolniensis, and so forth, as far as cornu-
biensis, and then back again through Wales and the
west coast, taking the Midlands afterwards. There will
be the names on the asset side of my account and I shall
not trouble myself about finding out the differences of
all these sub-species, I may safely leave details of that
kind to those whom it may sub-specially concern.

Now will you give me room for a paper of this kind
in your " Annals " ? If so, I recommend you to print
twice as many copies of that particular number as usual,
for I prophesy an enormous run upon it.

All this new-fashioned stuff and nonsense about
trinomials and nomenclature generally is begotten by
pride (or self-conceit) upon illiteracy, and a very pretty
progeny is the consequence ! Hartlaub wrote to that
effect forty years ago, but he was unheeded ; now you

have X the greatest sinner of all on this side of the

Atlantic. He has been attacked by men who only half
understand their business, so he has been able to score
off them. Of course, that has made him worse. His
ingenuity I admit, but his deficiency in common sense is
obvious.*

I am sure that the fewer new words a scientific author
makes, the better chance he has of obtaining readers,
even at the expense every now and then of a circum-
locution.

In like manner I can't see why people can't recognise
the existence of breeds or local races without calling

* Letter to J. A. Harvie- Brown, July 20, 1904.

TRINOMIALS 219

them " sub-species ' and giving each a special name.
Again, too, if sub-species why not sub-sub-species, any
number of subs, in fact ?

I suppose you are committed to use ' Vole," but I
hope you will give due prominence to the fact that it is
only the Orkneyan way of pronouncing and spelling what
in most parts of England is called Fell, and comes from
the Old Norsk fjoll — 'modern fjeld. Its first use is " Vole-
Maus," i.e. Fell-Mouse, and in England the beast's
common name is Field-Mouse. It was some learned
donkey who thought of dropping the essential Mouse,
and leaving the bare Vole, not knowing, of course, what
the latter really stood for.*

Already a year later he admitted that there were
worse things even than trinomials, trifles though they
were.

I thought you might appreciate that reproduction of
Wolley's sketch, and I am glad you do so, trifle as it is
— but then the world is made up of trifles, and from
some the more we can free ourselves the better. Of this
kind are trinomials, motor-cars, hymns, and cats — the
last perhaps the worst of all, for there is no avoiding
them. Until I am run down by a motor-car I shan't
much mind, and when I am run down I suppose I shall
be finished and so mind still less.f

* Letter to G. E. H. Barrett-Hamilton, April 21, 1904.
t Letter to J. A. Harvie- Brown, April 5, 1905.

CHAPTER XIII

LANGUAGES AND WOEDS

THE labour which Newton devoted to the recording and
identification of specimens for the Museum was equalled
or even surpassed by the industry of his researches in
the history of Ornithology and the meaning of names.
The most casual perusal of the " Dictionary of Birds " will
show that it is a mass of information with hardly a
redundant sentence. The Introduction, in particular,
which contains a history and a general survey of the
science of Ornithology, is evidence of a rare and wide
learning. From his undergraduate days Newton had
taken an interest in Scandinavian tongues, his knowledge
of which improved during his visits to Norway and
Sweden, and to these he added a considerable knowledge
of Anglo-Saxon. The present biographer wrote to
Professor Skeat asking for some account of Newton as a
student of languages and received the following letter in
reply : —

Cambridge,

June 25/09.

DEAR SIR,

I am quite grieved to find that I am unable to
help you. I spend much time in helping others — they
are quite welcome always.

But unfortunately I have not kept Professor Newton's
most useful letters. I used the information, all the same !

But you can say this :-

When I returned to Cambridge in 1864, I was
extremely desirous of learning Anglo-Saxon, but knew

220

ANGLO-SAXON 221

nothing as to the names of the best books, nor had I any
idea as to whom to apply for information, as the study
seemed to be absolutely unknown here. In this dilemma,
I applied to my oldest and best friend, who happened to
be at that time a Fellow of Magdalene College. He
bethought him of asking Newton for advice, who
at once told him that the easiest book for a beginner
was Vernon's " Anglo-Saxon Guide." I at once procured
this very useful work (now superseded by Dr. Sweet's
Anglo-Saxon Primer), and this enabled me to make a
good beginning. But for Prof. Newton, I should not
have known what to do ; and I owe it to him that I have
been enabled to study Old English successfully.

Prof. Newton was also well acquainted with Scandi-
navian, and was especially interested in Scandinavian
bird-names ; indeed he knew the names of birds in a large
number of languages ; and in many cases, knew the
history of the names themselves ; so that, for practical
purposes, his philological knowledge was extensive. He
most kindly assisted me (as well as the editors of the New
English Dictionary) in many of my etymological investi-
gations ; and I always found his information of much
value.

It is difficult to specify instances. But you will find
an example under Ornithology, in my book entitled "Notes
on English Etymology," Oxford, 1901, at p. 201. The
information afforded by Prof. Newton helped me (and the
New Eng. Diet.) to give a correct account of that word.
I again quote him twice (s.v. Staniel) at pp. 280, 281 , of
the same. And again s.v. Whimbrel, p. 319 of the same
work, I quote Willughby, whose work I never saw, but.
only knew by help of Prof. Newton's communications. 1
believe I was also indebted to him for a recommendation
to read Stedman's " Surinam," a most fascinating book,
which I read through twice ; it helped me (and the New
Eng. Diet.) to a correct understanding of the words
Piccaninny and Quassia, see pp. 213, 234 of the same
book.

Prof. Newton was naturally much interested in the

222 LANGUAGES AND WORDS

Anglo-Saxon names of birds. 1 remember that I pointed
out to him the list entitled " Nomina Avium " in ^Elfric's
Vocabulary, as printed at col. 131 of Wiilcker's reprint
of T. Wright's " Anglo-Saxon and Old English Vocabu-
laries," London, 1884. This he at once copied out on
slips of paper and arranged in alphabetical order for ready
reference.

By his assistance I was able to give a fuller account
of the phrase cockshut time than even that in the New
English Dictionary. This article is printed at p. 166 of
the Transactions of the (London] Philological Society for
1903-6. I mention his name twice on p. 167.

The only letter I can find from him is the one which
I enclose, which gives useful information as to the word
Avocet. You will see that he asks me to tell him when I
publish my views on the subject. But I have not yet
done so, as I cannot find the ultimate origin of the word.
The only suggestion I know is that it is a derivative of
Lat. avis, a bird ; and this is by no means satisfactory.
All I know about it is that it occurs in Florio's Italian-
English Dictionary (1598), who gives : ' Avosetta, a
fowle like a storke," and that he also spells it Avoserta.

I also enclose the note which accompanied a present
of Part II of his " Dicty. of Birds " (1893).

I am extremely sorry that I can help you no further.

Yours,

W. W. SKEAT.

The letter concerning the Avocet, to which reference
is made, reads : —

10.1.1906.

MY DEAR SKEAT,

Thanks once more. I find it was Gesner who
first described the Avocet and published its name — over-
leaf I have transcribed the passage. Aldrovandi, whose
3rd volume of " Ornithologia ' was not published till
1603, though an Italian, added nothing to the point. I
don't know, but I should infer that Gesner, who was a
modest man and did not vaunt his own experience,

PKOFESSOR SKEAT 223

probably saw the bird himself at Ferrara. It is rather a
misnomer for the people to have called the Long-billed
Curlew Spinzago, for its bill is distinctly blunt and not
needle-pointed. Pray let me know when and where you
publish your views as to Avosetta, that I may refer to
them if occasion should arise.

Yours very truly,

ALFRED NEWTON.

De Avosetta

Avis haec, cujus iconum in sequeli pagina damns, apud
Malos Ferrarse auosetta (ni fallor) nominatur, nescio qua
ratione : & a rostri sursuru inflexi figura beccostorta
& beccoroella. Lucarni circa lacum Verbanum spinzago
d'aqua : nam & arquata avis jam supra nobis descripta
spinzago simpliciter eis nominatur, haec vero aquatica
est, & palmipes.

Conradi Gesneri, Tigurini medici & Philosophise
professoris in Schola Tigurina, " Historise Animaliuni,"
Liber III, qui est de Auium natura (Tiguri : 1555), p. 225.

The above is the earliest description of the Avosetta,
but the same is first mentioned a few pages before (p. 215)
in the description of the Arquata or Spinzago simpliciter,
i.e. the Long-billed Curlew.

A.N.

He always spelt the Cuckoo in the old-fashioned
manner " Cuckow," and preferred to write the Whooper
Swan without the initial " W," for which he had the
authority of Professor Skeat :-

Cambridge,
January 4, 1906.

MY DEAR NEWTON,

I think the inconsistency in the spelling of
hoop-whoop is not exactly my own, but due to the per-
versity of the English public. The correct form (etymo-
logically) is hoop, but you cannot get people (as a rule)
to adopt it. But if you have the courage of your opinions

224 LANGUAGES AND WORDS

I should be glad to see the name hooper brought to our
notice. It's precisely in the same case as hole, adj.,
which became whole about A.D. 1500 or a little earlier,
and is likely to remain whole for another century.

The cause was that (about 1450-1500) a habit arose
of prefixing a well-pronounced w to words beginning
with ho., hoo, o, oo. I gave a long list of these, and
traced the fate of each word in the set, a few years ago,
for the Camb. Phil. Society. One of the most interesting
is hot, because Spenser got hold of the form whot, and
stuck to it ; but it has now become hot again ; for
the prefixing of the w was, first of all, in fashion ; and
secondly, went out again : zvhole and whoop are almost the
only ones left. But the w survives in dialects, as in
woaks for oaks and wuts for oats.

That's how I still write whoop, though I know that
hoop is better, and I still write delight, though I know it
to be an ignorant substitute for delite.

As to spelling reform, I should like to see it ; but
it is impracticable at present. I have an article to write
upon it for the B.A.

Yours sincerely,

W. W. SKEAT.

The origin of the name Capercally or Capercaillie
was the subject of much correspondence at one time with
Mr. Harvie-Brown and others.

Now about the etymology of Capercally. (Of course,
I know nothing, absolutely nothing, of Gaelic.) Having
to write the article thereon for the " Encycl. Brit." and
being in great doubt as to the spelling, I applied to all
such persons as I thought could help me — among others
to the corresponding Editor of the Encylopsedia, Mr.
McArthur, whom I requested to inquire of the best
Gaelic scholar he could get concerning the meaning, etc.,
of the name, and I herewith enclose you 3 letters which
were the result of that inquiry. The first from McArthur
introduces the others. I never heard of Dr. McLauchlan

CAPERCAILLIE 225

before and take his reputation on trust from McArthur,
but I doubt not he is a good authority. Not feeling quite
sure of the particular sense in which McLauchlan used
the expression " old bird," I applied to him again, asking
whether it signified antiquus, adultus, or senex, and you
will see that he says it means the last. " Capull " ( =
Caballus) you perceive he will not hear of. Please to
return me these letters at your convenience.

My own opinion, so far as it is worth anything, is
that the Gaelic name of the bird ought to be spelt as
McLauchlan says, " Capercoiile ' ' — but the English or
Lowland Scotch, I think, should be Capercally, or Caper-
kally (plural — ies). The first of McLauchlan's letters
shows, I think, how Sibbald's Capricalea came about —
' Gabhar," caper, the goat — but this is beside the
mark.

Your explanation of the interchange of z and y in
old books is I think hardly sufficient, for they were used,
I will not say indifferently, but at times one for the other,
long before the days of printing, and Old English MSS.
have a mysterious letter 5 or f about the pronunciation
of which some of the best Old English scholars are in
doubt ; for in some words it is modernized into gh, if I
remember right, frequently into y consonant, and less
commonly into z.*

I am really greatly indebted to you for all the trouble

you have taken in re Caper , but I am still in doubt

as to how I should best render the name in English.
The z is clearly not wanted, to say nothing of its being
misleading to a Southron, and it seems to me that its
retention savours of pedantry. It may be proper
enough in a proper name like Menzies, just as we have
people in England who stick to Smijth and ffolkes — the
" ij "in the first being merely a " y " marked to show it
is to be pronounced short, and the " fi " in the last
standing only for an initial or capital F.

Pennant, who seems to have been the first British (as

* Letter to Mr. J. A. Harvie-Brown, March 16, 1878.

Q

226 LANGUAGES AND WORDS

opposed to Scottish or Irish only) naturalist who mentions
it as a bird of this country, says that it was called " in the
old law books Caperkally." Your evidence contradicts
this, but in some of the subsequent Acts it may have been
so termed, for I have generally found Pennant pretty
accurate. Still he gives no particular authority and it
may be that he got this information verbally, in which
case he is certainly not far wrong, for I suppose he in-
tended the second " a " to be sounded broad, and I am
told that the nearest approach to the sound of the Gaelic
when written in English is ' ' Caper-coilye ' ' or perhaps
' Caper-choylye." It would be a great pleasure to me
to prove Pennant absolutely right by rinding a ' ' law-
book ' in which the name was spelt ' Caperkally '
or " Capercally ' -which last I am pretty sure Wolley
used to maintain he had satisfied himself was correct.

I wish Mr. Small wrote more distinctly, I can't be
sure whether he means his new derivation to be " Cabbar ':
(an old bird) and " Coille," the first word being written
to look more like " Cakkar."

I forgot to answer the question in your former letter.
I have duly received your paper on " Birds of Suther-
land and Gulls in the Forth," but no duplicate copy of
" Transylvania." *

The word written by Mr. Small was correctly,
' Cabher," signifying an old man, or old bird.

Soon after this Mr. Harvie-Brown began to collect
material for his book " The Capercaillie in Scotland '
(published in 1879), and Newton gave him much help in
looking for early references to the bird.

I cannot find a copy of Lindsay's (Pittscottie) History
in our library, but I have found that we possess 2 editions
of the Scots Acts. In the older (printed in 1566) there
is one of Q. Mary, 1551. " Of the prices of wylde and
tame meitis. Ca. Xj," which are to be :-

" Gran ' 5/-, " Swan ' 5/-, " Wylde geese of the

* Letter to J. A. Harvie-Brown, February 17, 1876.

CAPERCAILLIE 227

greit kind " 2/-, " Claikquink and rute ' -flSd.,
" pleuver and small meere foule " -/4d., " blak cok and
the gray hen' -/Qd., 'the dosane of poutis ' -/12d.,
" quhaip ' -jQd., " the cuning " 2/- until the next feast
of Fasternis Even and afterwards -/12d., laproun
-f2d.} woodcok -/4d.t larks and other small birds ~/4d.
the doz., " Snype and qualzie ' -/2d., 'tame geese'
-/IQd., " capone ' -j!2d., " hen and pultrie ' -/Sd.t
" chikin ' -/4d., " gryse ' -/ISd.

In the later edition (1681) the same spelling is ob-
served.

Now what can this " gryse " be ? Sold at 18 pence
when black cock and grey hen were at 6 pence and
" pouts ' (I suppose heath-poultes or moor-poultes,
i.e. Red Grouse, at 12 pence the dozen ! Was it Caper-
cally ?

Pinkerton in his " Hist. Scotl. " (II. p. 397) prints a
letter from one John Elder of Caithness to Henry VIII.
in which the former says : — " Our delight and pleasure
is not only in hunting of red-deer, wolves, foxes and
graies, whereof we abound and have great plenty."
" Graies " here are, of course, badgers, as also in the Act
of Jas. II. (of Scotland), 1455, prescribing the dress of
the Lords of Parliament, who were to have, " ane mantill
of reid, rychtswa oppinnit befoir, and lynit with silk,
or furrit with cristy gray grece or purray." The later
edition spells the word " griece."

Badgers, though eatable, could never have come into
the market sufficiently often to make it desirable for
their price to be fixed, and I only quote these passages
to be assured by you that the "grice': of Pittscottie
cannot refer to them.

But the " gryse " of Mary's Act puzzles me not a
little just as much as some of the other birds (?) named
in the same document.*

I can no more decide whether Dr. McLauchlan or
Me Arthur is the better Gaelic scholar than I can take

* Letter to J. A. Harvie- Brown, February 16, 1878.

228 LANGUAGES AND WORDS

on me to say which derivation is the truer. But what
makes me lean to the former is that not only has he the
latter 's experience to go upon, but also that having asked
the Editors of the " Encycl. Brit." to get the opinion of
the best man, and they (having opportunity of knowing
who that best man is and of getting his opinion) choose
McLauchlan. Of course, both he and they are liable
to error, and there are more differences of opinion among
scholars than among naturalists even, though Heaven
knows these are wide enough at times. What I should
recommend you to do is to state both and adopt
neither ! Your " Horse-cock " * brings us to the fabled
Hippolectryon of Aristophanes, or Cockhorse of our
childhood !

I don't think the law of priority can apply in the case
of derivations for a minute. We should have to accept
the famous lucus a non lucendo, Roma from Romulus,
Tibur from Tiburinus, and all the rest of the fanciful
derivations invented before Etymology was anything but
a series of guesses.

Dr. McLauchlan's letters were, of course, written with
the object of his views therein expressed being made
public, but Mr. McArthur, I imagine, would not like
being quoted as though he thought himself or was thought
to be a Gaelic authority, for he told me in one letter that
he was not.

I sent you a card yesterday anent Przevalsky — one
part of which (the 3rd) is wanting.

A Squirrel inquiry would no doubt be in some
degree interesting — but I don't think people will
value it so much as they will this Caperkally investi-
gation.

Everybody seems to think that " Gryse " in that old
statute means pig, I am sure it cannot be grouse. Have
you made out mittalis,atteils,goldings (NB.,gaulding is
now the general word in the English W. India Islands
for the smaller Herons), mortyms, schidderenis, brissel-cock

* This is a reference to an improbable derivation of the word from the
Gaelic " capull,"' a horse.

MISTLETOE THRUSH 229

(c/. coq de brossailes) or paunies (cf. paons) ? ' Lapron '
I take to be Hare (Lepus).

There is no doubt about the MS. use of § — drift =
knight is a good illustration of it.*

Mr. Thomas Southwell, a well-known Norfolk natur-
alist, found that the Mistle-Thrush was called in some
districts of East Anglia ' Drain," the same name by
which the bird is known in France, and he asked Newton
if he knew the origin of the word.

March 5, 1902.

MY DEAR SOUTHWELL,

I don't know what is the origin of Draine
except it be as Vieillot, in the passage I have transcribed,
says from the bird's cry " tre, tre, tre." Littre does not
attempt any derivation, but Holland compares it with
the Spanish Drena. It has long been the published name
of the Mistletoe Thrush in French books, and no doubt
Bewick quoted it from Buffon. Buffon, by the way,
is just as explicit about the birds feeding on the berries
and bearing some of its common names from the fact as
Vieillot is, and it is the same in various Italian dialects,
which all come from the local name of the Mistletoe.
Had not Mr. Engelheart ' missled," he would have
caught it pretty severely from me, but I am thankful
I have not had to administer the punishment, for in my
reply I stuck simply to the points he had raised.

Wilkin had prepared me for some discrepancies
between the different editions of Browne's ': V.E.," but
those you notice between that of 1646 and the others
are in this case of no importance. In Wilkin's reprint
he has the Greek word e£b/3o/Dog, which is clearly
wrong, for it ought to be igofiopos as it stands in
Browne's first edition.

I saw Wilkin's note about the European species of
mistletoe, but that does not signify as the Viscum album
admittedly grows in Greece and was doubtless the
original " t£os."

* Letter to J. A. Harvie- Brown, March 20, 1878.

230 LANGUAGES AND WORDS

The articles in the Standard that I mean began fully
20 years ago. Perhaps you know whether Mr. S- - has

been writing all that time. I never heard of Mr. K

or saw to my knowledge any of his articles. What a
discovery for him to make about Dodman and Thrushes !
If he be an imitator of Jefferies he must be bad indeed,
for I think the writings of the latter to be in the worst
taste possible. It has always amazed me to read how
much he is admired, for greater rubbish there can hardly
be. Whenever he tried his pen on human beings the
reviewers were down upon him, and most justly, for
they saw what stuff it was ; but knowing no Nat. Hist.
they did not find him out there. All the same I pity
the wretched man.

Yours very truly,

ALFEED NEWTON.

Writing in "Yarrell"* of the Mistletoe- Thrush,
Newton added an interesting footnote on the subject of
the bird eating the berries of the mistletoe.

This fact was known to Aristotle, as his name,
(i£o(3opo<i) for the bird shews. Dr. Prior, in his
' Popular Names of British Plants " (p. 153), gives the
derivation of Mistletoe, or its Old-English equivalent,
Mistiltan, " from mistl, different, and tan, twig, being so
unlike the tree it grows upon ; ' but my two learned
friends, Mr. W. W. Skeat and Mr. J. Rawson Lumby,
think mistl to be an unusual contraction of the unusual
form mistUc, which is a corruption of mistic (unlike), while
the Doctor's derivation, taken from Bosworth, is contra-
dicted by the use of the t in the old High-German mistil,
(mistletoe). This last, clearly the origin of the plant's
name, is probably from mist, meaning dirt or obscurity.
The idea of dirt, from the viscosity of the berries, is
most likely that which is here attached to the word ;
but it may refer to Mist, one of the goddesses of fate in
the Northern mythology, and in this sense Mistletoe
would signify " twig of fate," in connection with which
there is a story in Snorri's " Edda " (chap. 49). Tan,

DECOY 231

it may be observed, still survives in English as the

' tine " of a fork or of a stag's antler. Anyhow it would

seem that the proper name of this bird should be written

in full " Mistletoe-Thrush," and not, as commonly,

' Missel-Thrush." *

The origin of the word ' decoy ' is not generally
known.

" I have had no doubt since I looked into the question
of the origin of our word decoy. It comes straight from
the Dutch " eende-coy ' —Duck-coy — •" coy ' meaning
more than a cage but almost any kind of enclosure for
keeping birds alive. The ' eende ' not being under-
stood by Englishmen soon lost its first syllable, and then
you have the word exactly. I think I pointed this out
in a review I wrote somewhere of Payne-Gallway's book,
saying that it was absurd to speak of a Duck Decoy,
though of course one might properly speak of a Decoy
Duck.

Pijlstaart is nowadays even the common Dutch name
for the Pintail, which is almost translation of the word,
' pijl ' (pronounced pile) being a spike of any kind.
Pijlstaart was also applied by Dutch sailors to the Tropic-
bird from its long spike-like tail, hence Pijlstaart Island,
corrupted into " Pillstart," a well-known place to the
North of New Zealand, and perhaps repeated in other
seas. ' Staart " is, of course, tail, as in Redstart, Start
Point, etc.f

Partly by reason of his physical infirmity, which
necessarily made his life more sedentary than that of
others, and partly owing to his habit of discouraging
visitors except at stated hours, Newton had more time
for reading than have most men, and he was blessed with
an uncommonly retentive memory. Sale-lists and book-
sellers' catalogues from all countries filled his letter-box,
but he was not a collector of books, though his library

* " History of British Birds," 4th edition, I. p. 260.
t Letter to Mr. T. Southwell, May 5., 190u.

232 LANGUAGES AND WORDS

contained many of great rarity, and his purchases were
few. The University and Philosophical Libraries pro-
vided him with most of the books he wanted, and there
were few treating even remotely of Natural History that
did not eventually find their way to him. There was
usually something to be learnt from them, but there were
occasions when he found that his hours had been wasted
and then he did not hesitate to trample on the luckless
author.

I have been wasting 3 or 4 days looking over an essay
by a very great German classic on the Fauna of the early
Roman writers. I had hoped to have found a great many
allusions to birds and other animals all carefully set
forth, but to my disappointment there is nothing of the
sort, and the author avoids any serious difficulty. I
believe the authorities here have gone so far as to say
they will print this, but I should not advise it. You
may judge what the book is like when the author wants
to make out that the Napun, given by Pliny as an
Ethiopian name of the Giraffe, is the Okapi ! As if the
recondite resemblances between these two animals was
plainly visible to every eye, instead of being reserved for
those who are comparative osteologists ! People like
this ought to be shut up in Tolbooths or such-like places,
where the harmlessly silly may live their lives without
bothering others with their nonsense.*

His varied learning and his accurate memory were
constantly being called upon in the most diverse direc-
tions and were seldom found wanting. At a meeting of
" The Family," an old-fashioned University dining-club,
somebody raised the question of the ' No Snakes in
Iceland " story. One member present remembered the
reference to it in Boswell,f but it was Newton who knew

* Letter to J. A. Harvie-Brown, March 20, 1900.

f " Langton said very well to me afterwards, that he could repeat
Johnson's conversation before dinner, as Johnson said that he could repeat

SNAKES IN ICELAND 233

the origin of it, and at the request of Mr. H. T. Francis,
then Librarian of Gains, he wrote the history in a note
on the following day.

M.C., February 12, 1903.

MY DEAR FRANCIS,

I told the whole of the " No snakes (or owls)
in Iceland ' story, chapter and verse, in Notes and
Queries ever so long ago — perhaps 20 years — but I
cannot lay my hands on the reference. Briefly it is this.
There was one Anderson, burgomaster of Hamburg, who
wrote " Nachrichten von Island ' ' which was (posthum-
ously) published in 1746 or 1747, and therein the occur-
rence of Owls and Snakes in that island is mentioned.
The Danish Government did not like what he said
generally of the place, and employed one Horrebow to
reply to him. This Horrebow did in his " Tilferladelige
Efterretninges om Island," published in 1752, taking
Anderson's assertions categorically. An English trans-
lation of Horrebow appeared a few years after, each of
the subjects on which he remarked being headed Chapter
so and so. Thus you have " Chaper XLII. Of Owls.
There are no owls of any kind in the whole island," —and
the same with Chapter LXXII. " Of Snakes." I don't
suppose the book attracted much attention till Sidney
Smith (I think) happening to come across it saw the
absurdity and brought it into some article (on quite a
different subject) in the Edinburgh (?) Review and
the expression has since become famous.

Yours very truly,

ALFRED NEWTON.

a complete chapter of the ' Natural History of Iceland ' from the Danish
of Horrebow, the whole of which was exactly thus :—

' Chapter LXXII. — Concerning Snakes.

' There are no snakes to be met with throughout the whole island.' "

[" Life of Johnson," chapter xxxviii].

CHAPTER XIV

WRITING AND CONSERVATISM

As the years went on the number of Newton's friends
and acquaintances grew. Most of the leading zoologists,
and many besides, in this and other countries were
personal acquaintances and many of them were frequent
correspondents. He never employed a secretary and
was always most particular to answer a letter on the
morning after its arrival.

I don't know that much credit is due to me for
being punctual in correspondence. Experience has
shown me that in the end it saves trouble to be so, and
that is why I am never easy so long as a letter remains
unanswered.

He wrote on the back of each letter the date of its
receipt and the date of his reply : if the letter were of
any importance, he wrote and kept a rough draft (which
he labelled " draught ") of his reply. Nearly all letters,
excepting the most trivial notes such as invitations to
dinner, etc., he kept tied up in bundles. When it is
remembered that he wrote to and received a letter from
his brother Edward almost daily, and that his letter
address book contains several hundreds of names, it can
be believed that the accumulated correspondence of
more than fifty years amounted to tens of thousands of
letters.

Although he was invariably courteous and punctilious
in replying to people who wrote to him about one thing

234

CORRESPONDENCE 235

or another, he complained in private of the time he
wasted in writing to them : —

People keep writing to me on every conceivable
subject connected with birds, but there is nothing in
their letters on which I need comment to you. I begin
to suspect that I shall have to invent a lithographed form
acknowledging the receipt of a stranger's letter " which
shall have due attention," and then put it in the waste-
paper basket — after which there must be another form
to the effect that it " had received due attention."
This would make one much beloved.*

Apart from his purely scientific correspondence,
Newton wrote regularly on all manner of subjects to a
number of old friends, among whom may be particularly
mentioned Canon Tristram of Durham, Lord Lilford,
and Mr. J. A. Harvie-Brown. The first of these had a
severe "stroke" in 1893, and the correspondence was
interrupted for some months. When he was beginning
to recover, Newton wrote 'to him : —

I am indeed glad once more to see your handwriting,
and I congratulate you most heartily on having once
more resumed the practice of the 2nd of the " 3 R's " —
and in your case I may say of the 4th since R-ticulation
has been added to the others. I take it as a great
compliment that you should select me as the recipient
of your second MS., and I admire the judgment of your
Dr. in prohibiting the two P's — preaching and poli-
tics. I believe (miscreant that I am) that the former
makes few men better, and I know that the latter makes
many men worse.

You are easily pleased if you can find delight in
B.M. Cats ; as a whole a more useless litter was never
kitted, f not even one which a few weeks ago my man

* Letter to Lord Lilford, March 14, 1891.

t I.e., "British Museum Catalogues," of which he had a deep-rooted
dislike. A careless correspondent confused catalogues with dictionaries and

236 WKITING AND CONSERVATISM

found deposited by my (garden) doorstep and by the
desire of the mother's owner its members expiated their
uncommitted offences in a prompt water-butt.*

Even the comparatively trifling business of beginning
or ending a letter demanded a definite amount of care
and consideration. Mr. Harvie-Brown wished to dedi-
cate a volume of the *' Fauna of Scotland" to Newton
and sent him a draft of the proposed dedication, which
came in for Newton's criticism : —

I indeed take it very kindly of you that you should
wish to dedicate your book to me, but I confess I hardly
think that a regular dedication is merited by my services
or will in any way aid your book. It has already given
me much pleasure to be of any use to you, but I think
it only my duty to help any one who like yourself desires
to promote and extend the knowledge of Natural
History, and a few words in your preface or intro-
duction will amply repay me for any trouble I have
been at in regard to your book.

If, however, you insist on a regular dedication, I
would suggest that you should word it somewhat less
formally, and at any rate substitute "Dear Newton"
or "Dear Prof. N."- -for the "Dear Sir" at the begin-
ning, and " Yours very truly " or " Yours truly and
obliged " for the " Faithfully yours " at the end. This,
however, is only a matter of taste, yet taste has so
much to do with Dedications that on this account I
often think they are best left alone, or rather left out.j

Most of his letters were written with a definite

was properly reproved : — " In your letter you cite my note in the ' Catalogue
of Birds ' instead of the ' Dictionary of Birds.' Of course this was but
an inadvertence and being in a private letter is of no consequence. I
would only beseech you to be careful not in any publication to associate
my name with the former of these works, as I have no wish to deprive
its authors of the reputation it has achieved." (Letter to A. F. R. Wollaston,
February 16, 1902.)

* Letter to Canon H. B. Tristram, October 23, 1893.

f Letter to J. A. Harvie-Brown, January 15, 1879.

A ZOOLOGICAL ANECDOTE 237

matter-of-fact purpose, and "gossipy" is the last word
that could be used of them, but his quiet (if somewhat
caustic) humour relieved the dryness of many a page.
He loved telling and hearing humorous stories — Dr.
Guillemard remarks elsewhere that he laughed with his
whole body — and he often passed them on in letters to
his friends. The following was written as a postscript
to a letter * to Mrs. Hugh Strickland dealing with the
legal terms of a bequest to the Museum : —

Here is a zoological anecdote. Mr. G. X. is very
ugly and hairy. He went to call at a house a few days
ago and found only a little girl in the drawing-room.
He began to say something civil to her but she would
not answer. At last he said, " You don't know who I
am ? " " Yes, I do," she replied, " I gave you a bun at
the Zoological Gardens last Sunday — and, you naughty
man, you had no clothes on ! '

*

Newton wrote with a blunt quill pen a firm and
distinctive, but too often illegible, handwriting which
frequently baffled the recipients of his letters : —

Magd. Coll.,

May 26, 1892.

MY DEAR POTTER,

... I hope we may see you here one of
these days, and you know you will always be welcome
in my rooms. Poor Babington makes very little
progress, and I doubt whether he will get about again.
His doctor assured me to-day that it is only a bad form
of gout — a disease from which his very abstemious
habits ought to have kept him free — but it is said that
he has been a martyr since his marriage to sweet
puddings — so I pray you to take warning and believe
me to be,

Yours very truly,

ALFRED NEWTON.

* July 6, 1878.

238 WRITING AND CONSERVATISM

Mr. Potter replied that a diet of suet puddings was
hardly appropriate for a man of Professor Babington's
age, which drew from Newton a postcard : —

" Sweet not Suet puddings have been the bane of
C. C. B. The latter are not only excellent but, in
moderation, harmless. Excuse my bad writing. — A. N."

Most of his letter- writing was done in the morning
after a late breakfast. The afternoon he usually spent
in his room at the Museum, and late at night he did
the greater part of his writing : —

As for working at night I am sorry to hear that you
object so much to it. For the last 20 years and more
nearly all my best head work (if any of it has deserved
such an epithet) has been done between 10 p.m. and
2 a.m. simply because it is only then that I can ensure
being free from interruption. It is true that one
might get 4 hours in the very early morning — but then
one must interfere with other people's hours about
getting up — servants' especially — for I could not under-
take to do anything without breakfast and a fire, and I
don't think I am really the worse on the whole for my
early hours.*

He was almost meticulously exact in his writings,
which made him a slow worker, as it took him some
minutes to get up from his chair, find a required
passage in a book, and return to his chair.

. . . such reputation as I have for accuracy, and I
will not pretend to say that it is not to some extent
deserved. I have from time to time come an " awful
howler " for, do what you will, such things are not
always to be avoided, j

The " Dictionary of Birds," with its thousands of

* Letter to Thomas Southwell January 21, 1888.
t Letter to R. Holt- White, April, 1907.

PUBLISHERS 239

references and quotations, represents an amount of
labour that can hardly be computed, and the number
of inaccuracies in it is insignificant. One of his own
copies is full of hundreds of notes in pencil, many of
considerable importance, additions, suggestions and
corrections, which, it may be hoped, will be embodied
some day in a new edition.

As in the case of the Fourth Edition of " Yarrell,"
mentioned above, Newton was provokingly slow in the
preparation of the " Dictionary of Birds," so much so
that he had a serious quarrel with his publishers about
the question of payment. Many of his friends were
persuaded that he had a good case for going to law with
them, but such a course was distasteful to him, and
after many delays the book was completed.

It may readily be believed that Newton's habits of
delay were in a high degree irritating to publishers and
other people of business-like methods. The publication
of any book or pamphlet of his involved usually a
somewhat heated correspondence, of explanations of
delay on his part, and of protest on the part of the
exasperated and long-suffering publisher. During one
of these controversies, when he was in the throes of
publication, he wrote : —

I may use the words of Eli about his wicked sons
and say it is no good report that I hear of "Messrs.
X. and Y." ; but publishers I really believe are all
scoundrels alike, especially those of the highest repute.
One must be dumb before the shearers because one
can't help oneself. They keep well within the law,
which it is their business to know, but the law enables
them to fleece their victims at pleasure. I have
forgotten the particular incidents of the opening of the
6th Seal, but I know there is somewhere an uncomfort-
able place mentioned in which there will no doubt be

240 WRITING AND CONSERVATISM

room for publishers, and bootmakers, who next to the
former inflict the greatest misery on unoffending
mortals.*

He insisted always on a high degree of accuracy in
his pupils, greatly to their benefit in after years, and
advised them always to write down their ideas and
record any interesting observations. He would often
himself copy pages out of a book which he did not
possess, for possible future use.

Don't give way to the desire of self-advertisement.
Depend upon it your opportunities will come of them-
selves. But it is a good thing to write down one's
thoughts, theories and inventions, though it may be
years before one uses them. What I put into my
article " Migration ' was sketched out and in part
written one night at Brussels, at least 20 years before
I had the chance of putting it into the " Encyclopaedia
Britannica ! "

As to writing and tearing up what one has written,
I take that to be the only way of doing good work —
and even the practice I have had for fifty years does
not save me from that kind of thing. What I wrote
on Gilbert White for the " Diet, of Nat. Biogr." must
have been written and rewritten three or four times
at least, some passages perhaps less often, but others
more. *

. . . What I mean by " revision " — about which
you inquire — I can best explain by stating my own
way of proceeding. I write, rewrite, and again rewrite,
everything I intend for publication — beside reading
aloud to myself all I have written between the 2nd and
the 3rd writing — and again after the 3rd writing is
done. It is a tedious business, and apparently not

* Letter to J. A. Harvie-Brown, September 26, 1905.
t Letter to C. E. H. Barrett-Hamilton, March 23, 1901 ,
j Letter to R. Holt- White, October, 1899.

STYLE 241

always successful — witness Mr. - — 's improvements (?)
on my article — but on the whole it answers, especially
the reading aloud to oneself, for I would not, on any
account, have any one to hear me. Another thing in
" revision " which I have found useful is to get rid of
every word (adjectives especially) that has not an
effective meaning, and to reduce every sentence to the
smallest number of words. Here, again, it seems from

Mr. 's treatment, I don't always succeed, and so

in all humility I offer these suggestions. It more than
once struck me in reading your MS. that it was capable
of being strengthened in places by omitting a word or
two here and there, or by recasting a sentence. My
own experience goes to show that these emendations
occur to one when one is reading aloud, for then the
ear tells one that this, that, or the other might be
bettered.*

His own writings were distinguished by a marked
simplicity of style ; every word was well chosen and
seldom was one redundant.

You will see that I have always taken exception to
the use of " central " as applied to tail feathers. I dare
say this may be a bit of pedantry on my part, but my
notion of "centre" (and therefore of its adjective)
always implies a certain spot in a definite enclosed
space, and accordingly the word is inapplicable to the
middle feathers of the tail, though I am well aware
that it is often so used by authors who don't care for
accuracy. " Middle " is a good old plain English word
which may well be employed instead, f

... In the report (Migration) there are only two
things other than ordinary composition " fads ' that
seem to need correction — one is "most of" into
" nearly all " because a " most " occurs in the next

* Letter to R. Holt- White, May 5, 1900.
| Letter to T. Southwell, October 30, 1888.

B

242 WEITING AND CONSERVATISM

line, and the other is the misspelling of Rossitten, for
which I must hold myself guilty in my MS.

B.'s suggestions don't amount to much, and if it
would gratify him might all be adopted — though I
should shorten his " what may at present be termed "
into " apparently," that being vague enough for any-
thing. I dislike " commence " to do a thing — what is
the harm in "begin," a word which is going out of
fashion so fast that the next revision of the Old Testa-
ment is likely to open with the words " In the com-
mencement," etc !

I can never see why in serious writing Daws should
be nicknamed Jack. The word did well enough of
itself for Shakespeare, and naturalists do not generally
write of Tom Tits. Jack-Snipe is quite another matter,
and there the prefix has a real meaning, though it may
be of obscure origin.*

Being endowed with a very highly critical faculty,
Newton was naturally somewhat intolerant of the less
considered judgments of others. Among those who
came in for his especial condemnation were (often very
undeservedly) writers of "popular" Natural History
and the reviewers of Natural History books.

For a long while it has been the burthen of my
song that we have more Natural History Journals than
the country can afford, with the result that the numer-
osity is not only injurious to the Journals themselves
but to Natural History itself, as it lowers the tone of
the contributions. I wish I had friendly advice to give
you, but I hardly know what can be done. If you, or
any other man in your position (should such there be),
were to buy up one or two of these miserable periodicals
which have no excuse for their existence, I fear the
only effect would be that successors, still less worthy of
support, would be started ; and yet I know nothing
else that is possible.

* Letter to F. Knubley, August 16.. 1903.

REVIEWEKS 243

The lot of rubbishy naturalists we have about is
very great, and the worst of it is that the people of this
country like a low class of Natural History writing
better than a high one. Look at the way the most
wretched books sell, and the silly style in which they
are reviewed ! Editors of newspapers seem to think
anybody capable of reviewing a Natural History book,
or of writing a Natural History article. If occasionally
a competent critic does speak his mind, he is put down
as ill-natured or as having some private spite.*

Natural History reviewing is one of the lost arts
in this country. They still practise it rather well in
America, for the reviewers there seem to take some
little trouble to learn what the author has to say.
Here a man only scribbles off a lot of platitudes, or
if he wants to be nasty tells his readers what he thinks
the author ought to have said.f

In spite of his fundamental devotion to accuracy,
he was equally cautious in assertion, and he would
never, if it could be avoided, allow himself to be drawn
into controversy. He was invited to contribute to a
well-worn discussion about the hibernation of the
Cuckoo.

0 the Cuckow, the Cuckow ! What a bird that is !
I do not completely " endorse " (lingua Americana)
Baldamus, because it is manifest that his statement is
not " universally " but only " approximately " true, and
this is enough. Quod scripsi scripsi, and Newman
means to reprint my Nature article in the Zoologist.

'I have not the slightest wish to take part in a con-
troversy which promises now, as it proved to be before,
to be productive of much acerbity ; for the editor of
Nature three years and more ago sent me many letters
which he had received but never printed, and the

* Letter to J. A. Harvie-Brown, October 23, 1887.
t Letter to T. Southwell, February 27, 1902.

244 WRITING AND CONSERVATISM

violence with which people expressed themselves was
amusing. The Cuckow is one of the Englishman's

O CD

divinities, and anybody who strives to dispel or explain
the mystery pertaining thereto is supposed to be guilty
of profanity. It was this that chiefly made me abstain
from writing an article on " Cuckow's Dupes " which I
had long been perpending.

Dear old Hewitson would go at me with still greater
fury than he has exhibited towards you. "Doubt my
Cuckow, doubt me." So that in spite of your solicita-
tions (and there are not many of my friends to whom
I would sooner listen) I must preserve my peace of
mind.*

His habitual caution prevented him from uttering
theories about such questions as Classification or Geo-
graphical Distribution, and to matters of philosophical
speculation it may be said that he was almost in-
different.

I do not think Huxley can be charged with coining
the word " Positivism." I have heard it these 20
years nearly, though I confess I have never attached
any very definite meaning to the word, or cared to
know anything about M. Comte, the founder of the
system. I have heard Huxley call it a kind of super-
stitious infidelity which had all the advantages of
Popery without anything to counterbalance them, but
I am not curious in these matters and, believing that
everything in this world is comparative from Anatomy
downwards, I have not troubled myself to inquire into
the merits of a Positive Philosophy, f

In politics, as one might expect, Newton was
staunchly Tory, the old order was the best and changes
should be opposed ; but it cannot be said that he was

* Letter to Rev. A. C. Smith, April 22, 1873.
t Letter to Mrs. Strickland, June 26, 1869

POLITICS 245

ever actively concerned in politics, either national or of
the University.

We are all furious here ; the Council has refused to
allow a petition against Gladstone's Bill to come before
the Senate, and I believe we shall have to nonplacet
every Grace till the Council comes to its senses. But
I do wish we had a leader one could respect. The last
squib though from the other side is good —

O Teddy Perowne * is gone to his own,
He is gone to his own in a chariot,
On a fizzing hot plate he is sitting in state
With Pilate and Judas Iscariot.

1 It has just struck me that this is an obvious mistake, and for
"Teddy P," I should read "Billy Gladstone. "—A. N.*

When Lord Salisbury went to Cambridge in
January, 1891, he confessed that he had never been
to a political meeting in his life, and thought it useless
at his time of life to begin the practice of attending.

In College politics, as well as in greater affairs, he
was staunchly conservative, and in the progressive days
at the beginning of this century it often happened that
he voted in a minority of one. The following instances,
familiar to many Cambridge men, of his sturdy opposi-
tion to change have been so well told by Mr. Benson
that they may best be given in his own words :-

Shortly after this date (1905) music was introduced
into the service. There had not been a musical instru-
ment in the chapel since 1680, or any species of music,
and the introduction of the harmonium was a sore blow
to the Professor, who had hitherto successfully resisted
all attempts to establish an organ in the chapel. When
hymns were introduced, it was an unfailing amusement
to see the Professor open a hymn-book, and survey the
scene with ill-concealed disgust. He used to shut the

* Letter to H. B. Tristram, June 6, 1869.

246 WRITING AND CONSERVATISM

book with a snap before the end, and sit ostentatiously
down with an air of relief. He always said a loud
Amen at the ends of the prayers ; but when the Master
introduced a little prayer for the College, from the old
Compline Service, the Professor used to turn to the
pages of his Prayer-book, look round with dramatic
bewilderment, as though he thought the Chaplain was
delirious, and hold his lips stiffly sealed at the con-
clusion, for fear he should forget himself and add the
endorsement of an Amen to any petition of so singular
a character.

On another occasion it was proposed that ladies
should be admitted, in restricted numbers, to the
chapel service. The discussion was amicable, and a
system was suggested. To my surprise, the Professor
took very little part, except to interject an occasional
growl ; but when the motion was put to the vote, the
old man grew suddenly white, and in a voice strangled
with passion made a most vindictive speech. He said
that he disapproved of all the alterations in the chapel
service ; that it was no longer the least pleasure for
him to attend. Everything done or suggested was
utterly out of keeping with the idea of a plain collegiate
service. He disliked it all from the bottom of his
heart ; and he wound up by saying that we might pass
what votes we liked, but that if one lady was admitted
to the chapel service he should never set foot in the
building again.

An embarrassing scene occurred when one of the
Fellows asked leave that his daughter's marriage might
be celebrated in chapel. The Professor exploded in
wrath. He had never heard such a preposterous sug-
gestion. A College chapel was not intended for such
things as weddings ; the young lady could have no
associations with the place ; he regarded it as a most
improper and entirely unaccountable proposal. On that

COLLEGE POLITICS 247

occasion the rest of the governing body were rather
indignant at the attitude of the Professor to what
seemed a very reasonable request, the matter was put
to the vote, and the chapel placed at the disposal of the
Fellow in question. At the following College meeting
the Fellow withdrew his request. His daughter had
been so unfortunate as to break her leg while playing
lawn tennis ; she was to be married quietly in the neigh-
bouring village church as soon as she could get about.
The Professor smiled, and said, with really incomparable
humour, Solvitur non ambulando.

One great scene took place when an organ was
offered by one of the Fellows to the College chapel. It
was thought that the Professor would object so strongly
that the proposal was deferred. Eventually, however,
it was brought forward. The Master began by saying,
" I have a proposal to make about the chapel, which I
fear you will not like, Professor." The Professor flared
up and said, " No, indeed, I never come here without
hearing something that I dislike very much." The
offer was then stated, and every one then welcomed it
with cordiality and enthusiasm. The Professor waited
till they had done, and then, with a little bow to the
donor, said, " Words entirely fail me to express my
sense of the generosity and public spirit which prompts
this offer. But I am bound to say that I object in toto
to music in a College chapel. It is entirely out of cha-
racter, and I am therefore bound to oppose what I
believe to be against the best interests of the place."
The usual scene took place, the Professor voting in a
minority of one. But when the organ was erected, he
contrived to say something pleasant to the giver about
its improving the appearance of the chapel.*

As well as of bootmakers and publishers, Newton
was pardonably impatient of Bores : —

* A, C. Benson, Cornhill Magazine, June, 1911.

248 WRITING AND CONSERVATISM

I always try to love my enemies, but I think it
can hardly be inconsistent with Christian principles to
hate bores, seeing that the New Testament lays down
no injunction as to how they are to be treated, unless
by a slight change of spelling they are to be driven
down a steep place to perish in the water below.*

It is not easy to avoid conveying the impression of
a fiercely intolerant and prejudiced man, impatient of
opposition, and convinced of his own unassailable exact-
ness. Such he might, and doubtless did, seem to some
on first acquaintance, but, good fighter as he was, and
hating innovations, he had the keenest sense of justice.
Mr. A. C. Benson wrote f of him : "I never saw a man
who took a defeat better. He fought to the last
moment, and when he was outvoted, he accepted the
situation gracefully and good-humouredly. I never
heard him make any sort of criticism or recrimination
afterwards."

It is not unkind to say that he was almost com-
pletely lacking in emotion, but under his somewhat
grim exterior lay a really warm heart and an un-
expected depth of affection for and understanding of
others. He took a keen personal interest in the young
men who came to visit him, and his judgments of their
capabilities were seldom at fault : —

Balfour, J scholar of Trinity, was here last night ;

* Letters to Canon H. B. Tristram, September, 1892.

t Op. cit.

% Francis Maitland Balfour, born 1851, Scholar and Fellow of Trin.
Coll. Camb. Oxford was most anxions to gain him as a successor to the
late Professor G. Rolleston, and Edinburgh made repeated efforts to
secure him for her chair of Natural History. But he would not leave his
own university, and in recognition of his worth and loyalty a special pro-
fessorship oi animal morphology was, in the spring of 1882, founded for
him at Cambridge. On July 18, 1882, he and his guide set out from
Courmayeur to ascend the virgin peak of the Aiguille Blanche de Peu-
teret. They never came back alive (" Diet, of Nat. Biography").

F. M. BALFOUB 249

second in the First Class of the Nat. Sci. Tripos, of this
year, and no doubt the next Fellow of Trinity. Younger
brother of Balfour of Whittingehame. He is exceedingly
quiet and modest. He will IDC a very great man, and I
should be sorry to lose him from Cambridge. . . . He
will be more known as a student and from his researches
than in any other way, unless he gets over his
shyness.*

Nor did his interest in young zoologists cease when
they left the University. Most of them came back at
one time or another to see him at Cambridge, and he
was always generous in giving help and advice to his
friends : —

I don't say you are wasting time over Palsearctic
mammals. It is a great thing for a man to have a
special subject, of which he can become master; but
the more he is able to generalise the better, and this
especially in the matter of travel and observation in
foreign countries. Hence my great regret that you are
not going with Skeat, who (by the way) was here last
night. A twelvemonth in the Tropics could not fail to
do you a world of good. I know what a benefit it was
for me to have been six months and more in the West
Indies. A journey to Siberia would, of course, be very
profitable to you ; but it would not enlarge your view
as to Nature in the same way that working in the
Malay Peninsula would.

I always regret that I did not do more in the
travelling way, but various obstacles presented them-
selves. I ought to have gone to the Cape and to Aus-
tralia, to say nothing of the Sandwich Islands, f

* Letter to J. A. Harvie-Brown, August 17, 1874,

t Letter to G E. H. Barrett-Hamilton, January 19, 1899.

CHAPTER XV

WORK AT CAMBRIDGE

FEOM the time of his election to the Professorship of
Zoology in 1866 until the end of his life, Newton never
left Cambridge for more than a few weeks at a time,
and for the greater part of that time, until within a few
years of his death, when he appointed Mr. William
Bateson, F.R.S., to be his deputy, he delivered a course
of lectures in two terms of every year.

I began holding forth to-day and had a pretty good
audience — 30 or 40 at least — and 14 men were kind
enough to inscribe their names on a board, which means
as many pounds in my pocket ! I gave them some very
heretical notions (according to some people's ideas) but
wrapped up so judiciously that I believe even Clayton
would not have been shocked.*

Dr. Shipley has mentioned in another chapter
(p. 104), Newton's apparent shyness in lecturing : this
was probably an expression not so much of shyness as
of a strong distaste for the business of lecturing.

If I could afford it I would to-morrow give up part of
my salary to pay a lecturer who would be more com-
petent than myself, and such a man I could find easily
enough, because I know that I am one of the worst of
lecturers. In the first place, I never found myself
getting any real good from lectures when I had to listen
to 'them, and disbelieve totally in them. A man who
does believe in them might, or assuredly would, do

* Letter to H. B. Tristram, October 22, 1866.
250

ZOOLOGICAL TEACHING 251

better than one who does not. Of course, lecturing is
anything but the chief part of my duties, as I under-
stand them, and the rest I flatter myself I perform
decently.*

When the teaching of Zoology in the University was
considerably changed about the year 1884, after the
death of Francis Balfour, Newton went to the trouble of
writing a course of lectures on Geographical Distribution,
and another course on Evidences of Evolution. They
were very correct, painstaking lectures, but unfortu-
nately he found that they would not stretch over a
whole term each, of three lectures a week. He
announced that he would lecture on Monday, Wednes-
day, and Friday at twelve oclock, but year after year
he told the class that next Monday he would unfortu-
nately not be able to lecture owing to urgent business ;
and this would continue throughout the term. He
went instead on a weekly tour of inspection of some
farms with the College Bursar, his friend F. Pattrick.

It is quite certain that he put little value on lectures
as a means of teaching. What he thought of the
University course of zoological studies, or what he
would have liked to see substituted for it, is not so
plain to see.

A course of Elementary Zoology is undoubtedly a
good thing and I wish there had been such a thing in
my younger days, but my experience of it here is that
it is very apt to disgust or at least dishearten the man
who is by nature a zoologist. If he can stand it, all the
better for him ; but it is only a groundwork, and the
mistake so many people make is that after they have
gone through the course they think they are finished
zoologists, f

* Letter to Mrs. Strickland, March 18, 1874.
t Letter to N. B Kinnear, February 13, 1907.

252 WORK AT CAMBRIDGE

He never ceased to lament his lack of an early
training in Zoology, and quite unjustly accused him-
self of narrow-mindedness. Such a charge could never
be brought against the man who encouraged F. M.
Balfour in 1875 to establish a class in Morphology, a
subject of which he (Newton) was quite without know-
ledge ; he gave up his own private room in the Museum
to Balfour's class, and did everything he could to
promote its success.

The narrow-mindedness of which I accuse myself has
reference to other branches of science than Ornithology ;
in that I believe I have always been fairly afield, and if
I had only had anything of a scientific education, such
as boys and young men nowadays so easily get, I dare
say I should have been more tolerant of conchologists
and such like. You may imagine what a grind it was
when, at 37, I had to get up the animal kingdom for
myself and by myself in order to teach its nature to
others ! I often wonder if some of my earlier pupils
remember the astonishing blunders I know I used to
make. Fortunately, very few of my classes knew any-
thing about the subject, and I used to contrive to make
some of those that did teach me.*

He admitted frankly that the study of the Invertebrata
had little attraction for him, and he heaved a sigh of
relief when in the course of his lectures he reached more
congenial Orders.

November 23, 1877.
MY DEAR LlLFORD,

I have been busying myself, as usual at this
time of the year, with animals very unlike birds ; going
through the customary course of Invertebrates and, as
in each preceding year, becoming convinced of the
hopelessness of anybody being able to comprehend the
length and breadth and depth of them. These

* Letter to Col. H. W. Feilden, June 26, 1886.

MR. PERKINS AND THE DUKE 253

qualities would puzzle even Solomon himself had he
lived to these our days, only, like the wise man he was,
he judiciously expired before Comparative Anatomy
was invented, and so escaped the difficulty. I look
forward, however, to reach my paradise of Birds once
more some time next week and then, for anything I
care, the " slimy things " may " crawl upon the slimy
sea" just as they did in the presence of the Ancient
Mariner, until October next.

Meantime Ornithology with me has been almost at
a standstill ; nothing seems to have occurred worth
thinking about, nor have I heard of any shooting to
deserve putting on paper. The most sporting character
(observe the accent) in the University, namely the
tutor of Downing, has nearly sent himself out of this
world by trying to extract a thorn from his knee with
a knife that he had used a few days before for cutting
off a fox's brush, without cleaning the blade. Not
only his life but his limb has been saved, but he has
lost his liberty, and we the stories that are generally
current about his sayings and doings at this time of
year. Not many seasons ago the Duke of Cambridge
hired the shooting at Six Mile Bottom, which used to

^j

be Genl. Hall's, and as there are certain enclaves of
Downing property therein, he was advised to continue
the General's policy of inviting some representative of
that college to shoot. He did so, and this man went.

O 7 _

When they stopped for luncheon the bodily wants of
H.R.H. were attended to before those of any one else,
and this Jack Perkins thought bad manners ; so he
exclaimed : " Why, Highness, if you came to shoot
with me I should help you first ; and when I come to
shoot with you, I think you ought to treat me in the
same way." I believe he has not since had the
opportunity of being " helped."

Pardon me all this twaddle, and believe me,

Yours very truly,

ALFRED NEWTON.

254 WORK AT CAMBRIDGE

While I think of it. I heard one of the best bulls
yesterday. An Irishwoman giving evidence about her
husband, strongly in his favour, was at last asked, " Is
he a faithful husband ? " and answered, " Bedad, then
for that I couldn't say, sor, for my last child was not
his at all." Ponder this. — A. N.

To the end of his life Newton always protested that
lecturing was quite out of his line, and when he was
dying he insisted on his nephew Charles burning
bundle after bundle of lecture notes, lest they should
fall into the hands of some misguided person, who
might, perhaps, publish them under his name.

But the necessary course of professional lectures
took very far from a first place in his activities. His
friend and former colleague at the Museum, Mr. J. W.
Clark, wrote of him : —

From the first day of his election Newton took a
keen interest in the Museum, using this word in its
widest sense. He was absolutely catholic in his views.
Ornithology was his pet child ; but all the other
members of the Museum family were treated by him
with affectionate regard, even down to the preparations
of organs in spirit — which he never really liked, but
submitted to as necessities. He made his friends and
wide circle of acquaintances help him in the acquisition
of specimens from all quarters of the world ; and the
rapid development of our collections is largely due to
his energy. Without him we should never have had
the skeleton of the Extinct Manatee (Rhytina), the
White Rhinoceros, the Extinct Ox (Bos primigenius),
and many other rarities.*

The skeleton of the Bos primigenius mentioned by
Mr. J. W. Clark came from Burwell Fen, between
Cambridge and Ely.

* Cambridge Review, June 13, 1907.

CHARLES KINGSLEY 255

Nothing new of importance, except that I have got
through William nearly an entire skeleton of the most
lovely Bos primigenius, which I intend shall be the
envy of the world. I am going to have a further
search made for the missing bones, but as it is it is
wonderfully perfect. Such a monster ! He was quite
at the bottom of the peat resting on the clay and must
therefore have come to his end in very early days.
Also there could have been no wolves or foxes about or
they would have run off with some of the small bones
— whereas we have 7 out of the 9 tail vertebrae and
the bones of the tongue (hyoid). I got it, too, very
cheap, which is an additional advantage. A neigh-
bouring curate hearing that the men were digging up a
bull came after it for the Bury Museum while William
was there and had the head in a cart covered with a
sack. His reverence tried to make the men discon-
tented, but William held his peace.*

One of the friends who was always ready to help
him in acquiring specimens for the Museum was another
Magdalene man, Charles Kingsley, who wrote after a
voyage to the West Indies in the winter of 1869-70 : —

March 10, 1870.

MY DEAR NEWTON,

Your letter explains. I wrote a long letter
to Clark the day after I came back, bidding him send
it on to you and sending you messages, and had no
answer.

I have brought all I could get. Snakes (some very
rare) and bats. The niggers have shot all the birds.

I asked Clark, or you, to come hither, or both if you
could, see us, and see what you wanted to carry off.
They are few, but more are coming. If you will let
me know whether you can come or not, I will write

* Letter to Mrs. Strickland, April 25, 1874.

256 WORK AT CAMBRIDGE

more fully. We had no opportunity of using your
kind introduction at St. Thomas'.

The West Indies are a neglected Paradise. What
fools human beings are — specially English !

Ever yours,

C. KlNGSLEY.

P.S. — I have, I hope, opened a regular trail from
the West Indies to the Museum.

Kingsley was for many years a close friend and a
frequent, but illegible, correspondent of Newton, who
suggested to him the references to the Great Auk in
"Water Babies." The following characteristic letter
was with difficulty deciphered : —

Eversley Rectory,

June 4, 1867.

MY DEAR NEWTON,

Your bird books are delightful. Gladly
would I give up History to think of nothing but dicky
birds : but it must not be — yet.

Some day, ere I grow too old to think, I trust to be
able to throw away all pursuits save Natural History,
and ^ die with my mind full of God's facts instead of
man's lies.

Yours ever,

C. KINGSLEY.

On the back of this letter Newton wrote :—

Froude informs the Scottish youth
That parsons have no care for truth.
The Reverend Canon Kingsley cries
That history is a pack of lies.

• ...

What cause for judgment so malign ?

A brief reflexion solves the mystery.
For Froude thinks Kingsley a divine,

And Kingsley goes to Froude for history.*

These verses are quoted in Froude's obituary notice in the Times
of October 22, 1894, and are there attributed to "the present Bishop of
Oxford [Stubbs]."

INTEREST IN UNDERGRADUATES 257

Another of his activities, though necessarily less
public than those already mentioned, was his practical
help to young men who may have attended his lectures
or his Sunday evenings, in their efforts to obtain work
after leaving the University. The editor of this
memoir has received at least a score of letters from
people who have asked him to record Newton's sympa-
thetic help to them, often unsolicited, when they were
making their first flights from Cambridge. The fol-
lowing letter, written to a young graduate already
embarked on the career of Medicine, would almost have
persuaded most people to follow the unprofitable (in a
worldly sense) line of zoological research : —

I suppose I ought to congratulate you also on win-
ning the Surgical Scholarship, and if it makes you any
the happier I would do so ; but I do view with jealousy
anything that binds you closer to your " profession," a
very good and noble one I admit it to be, but I would
much rather see you devoted to Zoological Science, in
which the harvest is plenteous and the reapers, so far as
I can see them, so few.

I have the highest opinion of Lord Lister, but I
would far sooner be a John Hunter or a Cuvier. The
professional man is very good, but the unprofessional,
with no other aim than that of advancing knowledge, is
far better, and there are, unfortunately, so few men
comparatively who can follow science (as I believe you
can) regardless of professional success, the plain English
of which is fees !

However, we must be thankful for what we get, and
if a professional man of first-rate ability will but occa-
sionally devote a little of his spare time to purely
scientific (and unpaying) questions, we ought to
applaud him, and be grateful for the small mercy.*

* Letter to P. H. Bahr (now Dr. P. Manson-Bahr), March 26, 1907.

S

258 WORK AT CAMBRIDGE

A duty in the University which fell to him very
soon after his election to the Professorship of Zoology
was that of Chairman of the Special Board of Biology
and Geology, which he occupied with conspicuous suc-
cess for many years.

As to my Chairmanship of the Special Board to
which I belong, I was chosen to it years ago, and in
every year I have made a bond Jide offer to make way
for anybody who would like to take my place ; but
they seem to think my government divides them the
least, and so I am suffered to remain — perhaps as a
King Log ! But I am bound to say that we are a most
harmonious body, and my subjects are content to dis-
cuss matters peacefully. We do discuss I can assure
you (and on Saturday I sat for nearly 4 hours), but
as becomes philosophers. In other Boards I under-
stand this is not so, and personal wrangles (to us
unknown) are frequent. Seriously speaking, the self-
abnegation of our biologists — many of them, be it
borne in mind, young men of ambition only equalled
by their capacity — in regard to the interests of the
University, hampered as they now are by financial diffi-
culties, is beyond any praise that I can bestow.*

A Cambridge institution in which he always took a
keen interest was the A.D.C., more particularly when
a Greek play was to be given. Mr. A. C. Benson, the
present Master of Magdalene, writing in the Cornhill
Magazine^ recalls his first meeting with Newton during
a rehearsal of the Birds of Aristophanes in 1883 : —

We, the performers, were sitting about in full dress
at one of the last rehearsals, when a strongly-built man
of about fifty, leaning heavily on a stick, with a brisk
alert face and bushy grey side -whiskers, came into the

* Letter to Canon H. B. Tristram, November 26, 1888.
t June, 1911.

!>>/ ('. M. Newton.

THE PROFESSOR.

GREEK PLAY 259

room with one of the Committee. He seemed to me to
bristle with decision and alertness. He wore an old-
fashioned tall top-hat, very high in the crown, with a
flat brim ; and a short full-skirted tail coat. He looked
sharply from bird to bird, and then said suddenly,
" That scarlet Ibis is all wrong ; the head ought not
to be scarlet — it is preposterously absurd ; it must be
darkened at once."

The Ibis was the headgear of a friend of mine,
Willy Boyle, an extremely good-natured, able, rather
indolent Eton man, with much musical ability. He
took off the head. It was a pleasing object, made of a
long-haired rough red plush, with a curved black beak
and large, shining, roguish black eyes, represented by
means of a sort of glazed metal stud.

Some paint was brought, and Professor Newton
daubed over the bird-head with it, giving a dusky
draggled air. The owner looked on ruefully. The
Professor said sharply : " There ; that is better now,
but it is still ridiculous. An Ibis with a scarlet head !
Whoever heard of such nonsense ? ' It was not better
at all ; it was much worse, though perhaps it was
ornithologically correct ; but it sacrificed a pretty point
of colour. . . . That was my only sight of the Professor
at that date. He seemed to me to be decided, brisk,
peremptory, not very good-natured, not a man to
oppose in any way.

Newton wrote to his friend Lord Lilford about the
same production of the Birds : —

December 4, 1883.

MY DEAR LILFORD,

I suppose Aristophanes had not a much more
definite notion of an Ibis than he had of a Phoenix.
He had heard of both and so mentioned their names.
The great drawback to the performance here was the
very small size of the stage. Had there been room for
the men to stand, the members of the chorus should

260 WORK AT CAMBRIDGE

(and would) have been doubled. As it was they were
crowded so as to interfere with the effect, and their
wings had to be made so short as to seem ridiculous.
But it is, I am sure, a mistake to attempt a Greek
comedy. It was pitiable to see an educated audience
convulsed with laughter just because one fellow is
giving the stick to another, and there is a great deal
of stick work in the play. No one enjoys more than
I do seeing the clown pursuing a policeman with a red-
hot poker and any rough work of the kind in a panto-
mime, because it is according to nature — otherwise the
red-hot poker would not have been there — but it does
not seem natural for Greeks to indulge in common
buffoonery. It grated upon one's ears to hear the men
laugh in English ; one expected that they should have
done it differently and I would have had them laugh in
Greek if that were possible. . . .

Yours very truly,

ALFRED NEWTON.

Twenty years later the Birds was played again at
Cambridge, and Newton was much vexed by the pro-
ducers' attempt to introduce the Scarlet Ibis, the Rosy
Spoonbill and the Blue Jay, all American birds, in place
of the more sombre members of their families known to
Aristophanes.

Simultaneously the Greek play The Birds is coming
on this next week, and I am going to a rehearsal of it
to-night. The last time they did it, they made a very
pretty thing of it, and I hope this time it will be as
good. I have had some trouble to stop the appearance
of a Platalea ajaja in the chorus, just as on the last
occasion I had with Ibis rubra, which, as I dare say you
know, is in the popular mind the Sacred Ibis. I re-
member a picture painted by an R.A. in which it was
introduced in the courtyard of an Egyptian temple,
with Pharaoh's daughter or Potiphar's wife feeding it ! *

* Letter to G. E. H. Barrett-Hamilton, November 21, 1903.

HOSPITALITY 261

TJie Birds are doing beautifully. To my disgust
they dressed the Jay after Cyanurus cristatus instead
of the Greek form of Garrulus glandarius. It does not
so much matter as people take it for a Roller, which
it might well be had the ancients known that bird,
and it seems as if they didn't, at least they never
mentioned it.*

It was, however, in his own rooms in College, the
old Master's Lodge, that Newton's influence was most
widely felt. There he was at home to his friends every
Sunday evening during term time. After crossing the
bridge and passing the gate of Magdalene you came
immediately to what appeared to be a stable entrance
to a slippery and stony yard. Across the yard was a
narrow and ugly door, through which, after struggling
with a recalcitrant bell, you were admitted into a dark
passage leading into the Professor's rooms. Newton
delighted in hospitality and nearly always invited one
or more friends to dine with him on Sunday. If it was
your fortune to be a guest, you were bidden, rain or
no rain, to leave your College cap in his rooms, and
then you proceeded — "processed " is rather the word —
with him across the garden and through the hall to the
high table. Dinner was a heavy and thoroughly British
affair of roast beef or turkey and plum pudding, which
may have become irksome to the Fellows of the College,
who perforce dined there regularly, but it was interest-
ing to the infrequent visitor, who found that it agreed
well enough with the setting, and there was a charm
about Newton's courtly action of " taking a glass of
wine " with his guest and with others up and down the
table, which none of them is likely to forget. The con-
versation was sometimes almost startlingly in keeping

* Letter to G. E. H. Barrett- Hamilton, November 27. 1903.

262 WORK AT CAMBRIDGE

with the dinner, and the present writer will always
remember one night in a Long Vacation when he dined
alone at the high table with the Professor and the
Master, Neville.* We, or rather they, talked of the
Bedchamber Plot as of an affair of yesterday, and the
bewildered guest began to have doubts about his own
sobriety. After dinner an adjournment was made on
Sundays to the Combination Room. This involved a
steep climb up a rather slippery wooden staircase, but
Newton always refused assistance, preferring the use of
vhis two sticks. It is (or was) the custom to take the
dessert and port wine sitting at small tables about the
fire-place, and it is the duty of the junior Fellow to see
that the wine is passed and so on. When many guests
were present the decanter was apt to get delayed in its
progress, and Mr. Benson records that "the Master
once innocently suggested that for a change we should
sit round the big oval table. The Professor was speech-
less with indignation, and sate sullenly through the
proceeding, scarcely opening his mouth except to say
that he would hardly have known the place."

Nothing vexed him more than innovations : what
was the custom in that place was right, and there was
no more to be said. But he was always genial and full
of talk, and after a second glass of port wine he departed
with his guests to his rooms. There you would find a
blaze of gas (to this was added in later years electric
light), a semicircle of not very comfortable chairs set
about the fire, which was nearly always lighted, and a
tray containing cups and a pot of the strongest brew
of coffee.

Whilst the Professor was changing into a thin, black
coat made of a sort of cashmere material, which he wore

' Latimer Neville, 7th Lord Braybrooke, Master of Magdalene, 1853-
1904.

THE OLD LODGE 263

on these occasions, the guests had time to look about
the two rooms that were visible to the ordinary visitor,
and it must be admitted that there was little that was
pleasing to the eye. The walls, so far as one could see
them, were covered with an ugly drab-coloured wall-
paper, the floors with threadbare carpets, and the
furniture lacked beauty. Everywhere were books, on
the tables and chairs, on the floor and in book-cases
about most of the walls. Piles of papers and bundles
of letters were on the top of the books, and one might
think that the disorder was complete, but the Professor
knew where everything was, and when some point arose,
which demanded a reference, as often happened, he went
unerringly to the right spot. One or two water-colours,
a few rather dingy portraits hung high on the wall,
and a beautiful drawing of a Gye- Falcon by Wolf
were all the pictures that the book-cases allowed. An
adventurous visitor who looked into the Professor's
bedroom would have seen a huge four-post bed, and if
he got so far as the spare bedroom, the " Cowshed " as
it was called — it was built on the site of the old cow-
house of the Master's Lodge — he would have received
an impression of a brilliant blue wall-paper and of little
else. It must be confessed that Newton had little or
no sense of the beautiful, at least as it appears to the
younger generation.

Coming back to the inner room, where the coffee
was set out, one would find the Professor sitting in a
tolerably easy chair just inside the door : beside him a
table on which were a cup of tea, a blue porcelain jar
of tobacco, several pipes, a box of Russian cigarettes,
and a number of half-sheets of paper, of which he made
innumerable spills during the course of the evening.
He seldom used matches, and preferred to light his pipe
with a spill from the fire. This, for a heavy man with

264 WOEK AT CAMBRIDGE

two lame legs, was a toilsome business and involved
much exertion in hoisting himself out of the chair and
returning to it again, but he resented assistance in such
things. A stranger, unaccustomed to his ways, who
ventured to offer him a lighted spill, was rewarded with
a piercing glance and — " You're very good (a favourite
phrase of his), but I can help myself."

Between nine o'clock and midnight the cracked
door-bell would ring at intervals, and from half a dozen
to twenty visitors would come to see the Professor :
undergraduates and dons, old Cambridge men, travellers,
men of all ages and conditions. Conversation was
general, and though it was often of a scientific kind,
it was by no means so always. The Professor delighted
in humorous stories, which he often told exceedingly
well, and he had an abundant store of reminiscences of
people. Like many men of respectable stock he had a
high appreciation of " family," and he often knew more
of his visitors' family histories than they knew them-
selves. As somebody said, all genealogists are related
to each other.

If he liked successful and distinguished people, he
was equally glad to see those who had not yet made
their mark in the world and to help them, if it were in
his power to do so. When sous or relations of any of
his old friends came up to the University, he was at
pains to seek them out, and he was genuinely dis-
appointed if they did not come to see him.

I feel inclined to quarrel with you for not having
put me in the way of knowing " young Candler." He
came to my rooms on Sunday night, brought by a
young Jesse, son of the Abyssinian man, who has been
equally culpable in not letting me know sooner of his
existence. Candler seems a very good sort of fellow
indeed. I hope he liked his evening and will let me see

SUNDAY EVENINGS 265

more of him. It is a real pleasure to me to know men,
especially young men, of this kind. I know by my
own feelings what benefit I should have got, if in my
undergraduate days I could have been acquainted with
anybody a good deal older than myself who would be
willing to help me. It will be his fault if he does not
avail himself of the chance.*

The ugly rooms, the hard chairs, bitter coffee and
blazing gas do not make an attractive picture, it would
hardly be expected that men would go there again and
again, whenever they had the opportunity. It is the
fact, however, that the many people who have assisted
the present writer in his work have been unanimous in
bidding him not to forget " Newton's Sunday evenings,"
and some of them have even said that they remembered
them with more pleasure than anything else in their
time at Cambridge. It is difficult, often impossible,
for most people in after years to remember who was
the person, if person there was, or what was the
occasion, that pointed out for them their line of life ;
but it may surely be said that many a career of
adventure or research could trace its origin to the Old
Lodge at Magdalene.

It will not be considered unfitting to record here
the account written by a distinguished traveller and
naturalist, Dr. F. H. H. Guillemard of Gonville and
Caius College, of his friendship with the Professor,
which began when he was an undergraduate and
continued during nearly forty years.

. . . When I returned to Cambridge from Lapland in
October, 1872, 1 attended Newton's lectures for the first
time. The manner of them has more than^ once been
described. They were, I think, on the anatomy of the

* Letter to T. Southwell, February 27, 1891

266 WORK AT CAMBRIDGE

Vertebrata, but I am by no means sure, for I certainly
took no notes, and I do not think that any of us paid
much attention to them, though there was that about
the lecturer that made what is now termed " rotting '
or anything like bad behaviour quite out of the question.
They were delivered with a sort of professed perfunctori-
ness. He seemed to say aloud, with the old-world
courtesy that was so characteristic of him, " Gentlemen,
I am aware that this must seem to you rather dull
stuff, but it is my duty to deliver it, and I must ask
you to be kind enough to listen to it with patience."
He read these effusions standing and partly propped up
by a high stool ; now making hasty dives at a tumbler
of water, of which he would absorb a couple of quick
gulps, now moppiDg a heated brow with a large handker-
chief. I feel sure he hated these lectures. If only he
had taken bird migration or distribution as his subject,
how different it would have been ! But in those days
such studies would have been considered trifling, and
altogether beneath the horizon of professorial teaching.

I suppose it was at the opening lecture that we
inscribed our names. Seeing mine, he inquired what
relation I was to a member of my family whom he knew.
I told him. He then asked, I suppose by way of some-
thing to say, where I had spent the Long Vacation.
My reply of " Lapland " fairly galvanised him.
" What ! Lapland ! What did you go there for ? '
" Well, sir, chiefly after birds." "Birds! Look here,
what are you doing on Sunday next? Come to my
rooms in Magdalene at half-past eight." And
thus — now, alas ! nearly fifty years ago — began our
friendship.

Nowadays, of course, an invitation such as this is
common enough, and I understand that the under-
graduate occasionally even calls his tutor by his
Christian name. But this was certainly not the fashion
at the period of which I speak. The don in those days
as a rule only bade you to his rooms for the purpose
of gating you, so I was proportionately impressed and

DE. GUILLEMARD 267

presented myself at the hour appointed. Newton's
rooms have been described by Mr. Benson in his
"Leaves of the Tree," and I think he does them
considerable injustice. For him they were the last cry
of the mid- Victorian epoch, of a type calculated to
make the strongest aesthete shudder. I am rather
abnormally affected by my surroundings, but I never
experienced in them any such feelings of artistic malaise.
Books, to my thinking, are the most seemly of all wall
adornments, and with books the walls of Newton's
sitting-room (for in those days he had but one) were
almost entirely covered, and, I might add, the chairs
and sofa also. There was, it is true, but little in the
way of decoration, but what there was was good.
Immediately over the door by which one entered hung
a magnificent pair of reindeer horns — the spoils, I
fancy, of his Lapp journey, and facing the wide French
window was a beautiful watercolour of an Iceland
Falcon by Joseph Wolf (the one man, as Newton used
always to say, who could draw the birds of prey).
Another, or rather a colour print, by the same hand,
hung over the mantelpiece, and in later days a
Japanese kakemono by a celebrated artist, representing
a skein of geese dropping down to the water, occupied
the only book-free space on the window side.

Newton's manner with unfledged youth was very
kindly and reassuring. He talked to them as equals,
which seemed strange to us in those days when the
gulf between don and undergraduate was of unfathom-
able depth, and soon made them feel as much at their
ease as was possible in the early 'seventies. We sat
rather close together, the room being small, and I
remember being rather astonished (so different were
things then) at the presence of tobacco and spirits, the
latter, of course, being in the form of brandy, for
whiskey was at that time a fluid almost unknown to the
southron, though I had made its acquaintance in the
Orkneys. Strangely enough, I can recall but few of
the early habitues of Newton's salon. There was E.

268 WORK AT CAMBRIDGE

Knubley of Magdalene, a " birdy " man ; Frank Balfour,
very popular, of course, with everybody ; Richard
Lydekker, tire d quatre epingles, as the French say, a
great swell with a future before him in the world of
science; and Ernest Muggeridge of King's,* the only non-
Etonian of the thirteen undergraduates of that College,
a keen entomologist, with whom — in company with our
present Slade Professor of Fine Art, Edward Prior —
I used to make excursions to the Northamptonshire
woods. Frank Darwin I remember, and G. R. Crotch,
University Sub-Librarian, a mighty beetle-hunter before
the Lord. Duppa Crotch too, I believe, was often there,
though I think at a somewhat later period — Shakesperian
and autophagist. For, with what truth I know not, the
story ran that while chopping wood one day he inadver-
tently severed a digit. To take it to the cook and order
it for dinner was, as the reporters say, the work of an
instant. Anxious, as a true student of Nature, to prove
everything, he was loth to lose such a God- sent oppor-
tunity for a blameless cannibalism. Later came Adam
Sedgwick, Bateson, Marr, Dr. Sharp, A. H. Evans,
Barrett-Hamilton and a host of others well-known in the
world of science to whom I need not further allude.

Newton welcomed me very warmly that first evening,
I remember, and questioned me about where I had been
and what I had done. I felt that in his eyes it was some-
thing to be an habitue of Stevens's, more to have worked
the Copinshay cliffs in search of eggs, and still more,
perhaps, to have camped on the Qvikkjokk fjells. But
although these facts may have prepossessed him in my
favour I really ascribe the special warmth of my welcome

* Muggeridge was a man of very fine character and most lovable
disposition. He was a great friend of Henry Bradshaw, who wrote " JSTo
one can ever know how much I owe to Ernest ... as any one must who
saw much of him and did not find the strength in himself to do the right
which he knew he ought to do. . . . The memory of such a friend is a
thing to help one on in life as few other things except his living self
could do." He died in Hongkong in 1879, and years afterwards I sought
in vain for his grave in the " Happy Valley " there. His remains, as 1
later discovered, had been brought back to England.

THE PROFESSOR'S PIPES 269

to quite a different and much more trivial cause, but
one so characteristic of Newton that I cannot omit it
here. The Professor's pipes, of which he had many,
each being in turn allotted its spell of work, were all
precisely similar. They were of briar, a short quadran-
gular basal stem carrying a stout bowl with a chamfer
at the mouth, below which was a single ring of fine
beading. The real stem was of chicken bone, fitted in
with a cork plug. When, being asked if I would like
to smoke, I drew a precisely similar article from my
pocket, Newton was delighted. There could be no
stronger evidence of my common sense and intelligence,
and from that moment I was "approved." After that,
I believe, I might have proclaimed myself a Socialist, or
proposed that women should dine in Hall, or spoken of
S- as the greatest living ornithologist with im-
punity. All would have been forgiven.

That first evening was the forerunner of countless
others. For, though I ceased to be resident after
taking my degree, and for many years was incertce sedis
as the phrase goes — a wanderer over the earth — I always
came back to Cambridge to work up my collections and
always went to Newton's Sunday evenings as a matter
of course. That was the great thing about Newton —
one always found him where one left him, not only
socially, but topographically. One might brave the
Arctic ice or disappear for a year or two into the heart
of the Dark Continent, but when one returned with no
little of the Rijp van Winkel feeling at heart, there was
Newton sitting in his chair making spills, just as
one left him. It almost made one wonder whether all
our past adventures were not a dream, and our moving
accidents by flood and field mere figments of the
imagination.

No one, indeed, could be more immutable than
Newton in his daily doings, which were all ruled on the
Medo-Persic plan. I do not precisely remember his
hours, but I am pretty certain that a good deal of his
work was done at night, and hence — though hardly in

270 WORK AT CAMBRIDGE

the running with Bradshaw — he was not a very flagrant
early riser. His daily wayfaring to the Museum was an
affair which called for no little effort on his part, for his
great lameness — much accentuated by the accident that
befell him in Heligoland — made him a " four-legged
man " ; he used a stick in each hand and his rate of
progression was not rapid. In his room at the Museum
he sat with the door open, and was thus enabled to
waylay any passer-by with whom he wanted to talk.
His lunch consisted usually of a glass of sherry and a
biscuit of the nature of a " Captain's," or first cousin
thereto, and when, for some reason which I do not
recall, these odontoclastic delicacies became unobtain-
able, the whole tenour of his life seemed in danger of
being upset until it was discovered that the College cook
could produce an article equally solid in substance if
not superior in merit. By this Spartan diet he was
supported until dinner-time, at which meal he played a
good English knife and fork, keeping up with marked
gravity of ceremonial the old-fashioned custom — confined
nowadays, alas ! to his own College and that of Magdalen,
Oxford — of " taking wine " with his guests. Though
not intolerant of the "beaded bubble winking at the
brim" it was the more serious vintages of the Penin-
sula which chiefly appealed to him. A mutual friend
reminds me of the appreciation with which he held
a particularly attractive glass of port to the light and
murmured " How old Kingsley would have lapped
this up ! "

A more congenial neighbour at dinner no one could
wish for, but he was at his best with a small party of
" birdy " friends where conversation was more or less
general and the political atmosphere purged of " all

those d d Radical ideas " which found such scant

favour in his sight. To put it mildly, Newton was no
Progressive. In his eyes alteration of any kind was
the one unpardonable sin ; change little short of a crime.
I feel sure that the donning of a new suit must have
caused him actual pain, and he avoided inflicting it as

A TORY OF THE TORIES 271

much as possible. The pea-like similarity of his little
black silk ties must have mitigated his anguish in the
matter of what is now gracefully termed neckwear. As
a thing was, so it had to be, whether in habit of body or
of mind, and hence he did not readily adopt many of
the latter-day views in ornithology. Of all men I ever
knew he was the least carried about with every wind of
doctrine. Trinomialism was abhorrent to him — it cer-
tainly threw a shadow over his later years — and the
Turdus turdus turdus craze rendered him well-nigh
speechless. I wonder what he would have thought of
cubism had he lived to see it ! Not that he was in the
least averse from new ideas in his favourite science so
long as they came, so to speak, with good introductions.
He held an open mind with regard to classification, and
indeed (good naturalist as he was) was quite capable of
embracing subversive, if not revolutionary views did
the arguments in favour of them but hold water. He
welcomed, or was even the actual initiator of, many
new developments of ornithology, notably those con-
nected with Migration and Close-time, which I need
not enlarge upon here. But at bottom, as I have said,
he was a Tory of the Tories, and ofttimes, too, in rather
unexpected ways. One did not always detect from afar
the red flag which induced the vehemently taurine
attitude.

With all his classical leanings Newton was not a
particularly " booky " man. Apart from travels and
scientific works, with which he kept himself thoroughly
au courant, he did not trouble himself much about the
moderns, but it would not have been easy to mention
any pre-Edwardian book that had won its way to fame
with which he was unacquainted, whether fact or
fiction. Thackeray was a special favourite. I cannot
now recollect whether he knew him personally, but I
well remember his description of a joyous individual,
Arcedeckne by name,* from whom, he told me,

* This, no doubt, was Andrew Arcedeckne, son of Chaloner
Arcedeckne, who matriculated at Christ Church, Oxford, February 6, 1798.

272 WOKK AT CAMBRIDGE

Thackeray drew the character of Harry Foker, and
how he went up after the finish of the lecture on
" The Four Georges," slapped Thackeray on the back,
and said " Splendid ! old cock, but why didn't you
have a pi-anner ? " Those who knew the subject of
these notes will picture the appreciative quakes which
shook his abundant waistcoat in relating the story. It
did one good, I may remark parenthetically, to see
Newton laugh. I do not think I ever knew any one —
unless it was Arthur Hilton, the inimitable author of
the Light Green — whose face, nay, whose whole figure,
were (on occasion) more vividly expressive of mirth ;
though, it must be confessed, they could equally well
express other moods when necessary. It is rather diffi-
cult to realise that any one so meticulously careful can
have been a whole-hearted lover of fiction, yet such
no doubt he was. That wonderful book, " A Dic-
tionary of Birds," shows no evidence, save that of a
catholicity of reading, by which one might detect it.
His was, indeed, a peculiarly tidy mind, and if he were
not accurate I do not know who could be thus
described. He would take immense pains about a
verification, and always had chapter and verse under
his hand, like Robertson Smith. There was no shadow
of slackness about him, and one instinctively tightened
up one's ordinary diction when in his company. He
did not like " zoo " or " rhino." I wonder what he
would have said could he have seen the legend on a
parcel sent me not long ago — " Photos on appro, for
repro." ! He held the pen of a good, if not a ready
writer, and expressed himself in excellent clear nervous
English, though I remember his lamenting to me that
he wrote slowly. He was a capital letter- writer,
though I became aware of this chiefly from his letters
to others, notably those to his lifelong friend Lord
Lilford, for in my journeys I was seldom in very

Lord Huntingfi eld, his relative, who possesses his beautiful gold-headed
cane, tells me he was said to have been much like a seal in appearance,
and hence Thackeray's name of Foker (Latin Phoca). — F. H. H. G;

OLD AGE 273

accessible places, and at home we lived too close to
render writing necessary, except for dinner invitations.
In these his old country-house habits came out, and he
would often say, " There is a good moon now, will you
give me the pleasure of your company (I think it was
always ' the pleasure of your company ') on Sunday
next."

With the advance of years Newton's infirmities
evidently became a greater trial to him, but he bore
them bravely and seldom spoke of them. One by one
his own people had passed away before him and he
grieved over their going. " I am the last of my
generation," he would pathetically and curiously often
say. Then it became evident to him that his own days
were numbered. The call came lingeringly, and he
fought the enemy inch by inch. Near the end he
rebelled against dying in his bed and directed that he
should be placed in his arm-chair. " Here will I meet
my fate," he said, in quaintly stilted phrase ; and in
his chair he died.

In the light (or, should I not say, the darkness) of
these post-bellum days, Newton must be accounted an
extinct type, as extinct as the Great Auk and Dodo of
which he loved so much to write. Such strength of
individuality I cannot recall in any other person I have
known. It can safely be said that, having carefully
envisaged his question and decided it, no human power
could make him alter his mind. Yet one almost
hesitates to say it, lest a wrong impression should be
conveyed, for he was one of the most lovable of men,
and inspired an unusual degree of personal affection in
the many young men who frequented his rooms. The
influence he exercised upon them was remarkable, not
only upon the ornithologists, but upon men like Adam
Sedgwick, Bateson, Frank Darwin, Lydekker, and a
host of others in different fields. It would, I think,
be correct to describe him as the founder of the
modern Cambridge scientific school, developing the
good seed sown by Henslow, who was to a former

T

274 WORK AT CAMBRIDGE

generation, T imagine, very much what Newton was to
mine. God rest his soul ! How I wish I could bring
him back ! There are few of whom I have such kindly
recollections.

F. H. H. GUILLEMARD.

1920.

CHAPTER XVI

LATER YEARS

ALTHOUGH, as has been stated above, Newton's home
during the last fifty years of his life was at Cambridge,
it must not be supposed that he spent all his days in
museums and libraries. He was, first of all and by
nature, an out-of-doors man, and in early days he was
a keen game shot. " Here I oscillate between a gun
and a proof-sheet," he wrote in September, 1 870, from
Bloxworth, in Dorsetshire, where he spent a part of
every summer with two of his sisters between 1866
and 1886. He was a large and powerfully built man,
and in spite of his lameness he could move about rough
country with astonishing ease. At one time or another
he made expeditions to many of the remote parts of
Britain, and nothing delighted him more than days
spent in watching birds.

The chief thing I have to tell you of is a charming
day at Pentire, a headland on the N. coast of Cornwall.
When I wrote last I think I told you I had got Gat-
combe to arrange for an expedition in search of Choughs.
We started about 7 o'clock in the morning and went
by rail to Bodmin Road Station, where we had a car-
riage to meet us, and getting into it passed through
Bodmin (just like an Irish town) and Wadebridge.
Thence we bore to the right to a place called Trevornan,
a comfortable old house where lived a cheery old lady
whose nephew, a certain Mr. Darrell Stephens, was the
man who was to show us the Choughs. He is a very
good sort of fellow, some 21 or 22 years old, preparing

275

276 LATER YEARS

to be a land agent, and to that end he has been learn-
ing his business under Baron Hambro's man at Milton
Abbey where, having a great taste for botany, he had
become acquainted with Mansel-Pleydell.

As it was still early we declined being " refreshed "
and almost immediately started again in the carriage,
taking Mr. Stephens with us, and so went some 2 or 3
miles to the sea, along the right bank of the river that
runs through Wadebridge, our drive ending by crossing
a beautiful hard sand, for the tide was out. Then we
sent the carriage to a neighbouring farm-house to wait
for us and took to our legs, scrambling up the cliff and
along it towards Pentire Point. A great part of the
cliff here is steep for say 200 feet above the water with
a steep grassy slope above it.

Mr. Stephens was very keen about the rare plants
that grew here, but I am afraid they were rather lost
upon me, though I could well admire the enormous
number of wild flowers which made the turf quite
bright with all sorts of colours. I don't think too that
I ever saw more butterflies at once, a great many of
one of the " Blues," which, by the way, exactly matches
in colour the flower of the Squill which was growing in
abundance. There was also a great number of Colias
edusa. We were scarcely ever out of sight of one, and
I hardly exaggerate when I say that in some spots they
were in flocks. As we kept ascending towards Pentire
Point the view became more and more extensive and
beautiful ; but of course our chief object was the
Choughs, which Mr. Stephens had seen constantly for
some weeks past. The cliff and slope were broken in
places by little ravines, "gugs" they call them, some
of which we could cross while others it was better to
walk round. Just as we were climbing the side of one
of them, rather a shallow one, we all three heard a note
which was perhaps most like a jackdaw's of any I had
ever heard, but still unmistakably different. I knew
at once it must be a Chough's, and looking up we saw
on the wing 3 black rook-like birds that seemed to

CORNISH CHOUGHS 277

have risen from the cornfield that skirted the slope
and was bounded by a stone wall. They flew on and
disappeared over the ridge and Mr. S. said they would
be seen to settle on the rocks. When we got to the
top of this ridge we found ourselves almost at the end
of the slope, for the other side of the next " gug " was
precipitous almost to the top.

I may say that the slope is so steep that though it
abounds in rabbits Mr. S. says it is difficult to get
them, for when shot they roll down into the sea ; in
places it must be 200 yards wide at least.

Well, at first we could see no Choughs, but after a
while we made out first 2, and then the third, sitting
on the side of the cliff, and then getting as near as we
could we lay down and watched them with our glasses.
Two of them, a pair I should think, sat quite close
together and were preening their feathers. It was a
bright cloudless day and as they sat in full sunlight we
had a capital view of them with the beautiful purple
gloss (which was quite plain) on their feathers, and
their red bills and legs, the last, however, not so bright
as I should have expected. These birds were not con-
tent with arranging their own feathers but they fre-
quently trimmed one another, especially their heads,
and one could see one bird shut its eye while the other
was carefully picking round it. These two birds seemed
to take no notice of us, we were perhaps just out of
ordinary gun-shot, but the third was more fidgetty and
kept jumping from one rock to another and every now
and then calling out. I could have stayed watching
them much longer, but we had to be going on ; so after
half an hour, or perhaps not so long, we proceeded, and
then after a short flight or two they rose up and came
back over our heads within easy shot. On the wing
they look much more like Rooks, indeed one might
have some trouble to distinguish them, but their wings
seem larger in proportion to their bodies, just as Stock-
Doves' are larger than Ring-Doves'.

These birds we saw no more. By and by we got to

278 LATER YEARS

the headland, where the view was really magnificent,
the whole coast, from Hartland Point in Devonshire to,
as they said, Cape Cornwall, being within sight. How-
ever, I think it is impossible we could see Cape Corn-
wall, and that our furthest point to the westward was
the Gurnard's Head ; but that is close to it. Pentire is
so high that you see over some of the intervening
points, Trevose Head in particular, which juts out much
further from the regular trend of the coast. In the
distance we had Lundy Island. I don't know when I
ever saw such a bright day, everything seemed to
sparkle with light. Inland to the eastward we had
Row Tor and Brown Willy, which are near the Cheese-
wring, and I was pleased to find I recognised their
outline, though I had never seen them before from this
position. To the south was the estuary of the river on
which Wadebridge stands, with a great bar of sand
across it, and another river that comes from Padstow.
But all the interior of Cornwall is alike (except the
wooded valleys), and our eyes were chiefly seaward, as
the shore immediately below us we could not see.*

In the summer of 1882 an unfortunate accident
crippled him still further.

My summer has been one of shattered hopes. A
friend of mine, Woodall by name, agreed to take Tris-
tram and myself for a cruise in his steam yacht to
Heligoland and Denmark, and accordingly we went on
board the Garland at Yarmouth on the morning of
June 1. We did not get off, however, for two or
three days afterwards, owing to the weather ; for our
yachtsman, even when he has a tea-kettle to rely upon,
does not like knocking about in a head wind.

At last we had a fair run to Heligoland, and a most
enjoyable interview with Gatke and his marvellous
collection.

Mrs. Governor of that important dependency was

* Letter to Edward Newton, September 19, 1877.

ACCIDENT AT HELIGOLAND 279

bent upon hearing Tristram's eloquence, and, accord-
ingly, after being there 2 or 3 days, we departed,
promising to bring the Canon back to fire off the
following Sunday.

In the meanwhile we went to Bremerhaven, and
then by land to Bremen and Hamburg, looking up
friends ornithological and otherwise at both places.
We attempted to return to Heligoland to fulfil our
promise, but were blown back to the Weser, and there
passed 2 or 3 days uselessly. At last we did reach
Heligoland again, and meant to be off at daybreak
next morning for Jutland, where I had in view a visit
to several happy hunting grounds — Avocet, Black
Stork, and other nice things. But the glass fell and
the wind rose, so we had to lie in the roadstead some
days more. The gale was so heavy that we broke an
anchor, and had several other little misadventures,
while every hour our chance of going to Denmark
diminished ; for both Woodall and Tristram had en-
gagements at home they were bound to keep.

When the weather in some degree moderated we
went ashore, to dine and sleep at the Governor's house ;
and coming back the next day, as I was stepping into
the boat from the pier, the big tendon of my sound leg
snapped just above the knee-cap. I, of course, col-
lapsed ; but it is impossible to exaggerate the kindness
of everybody, and after a surgeon had come off to the
yacht and built up a wall of plaster of Paris and tow
along the whole length of my leg, we got under way
for Yarmouth direct. Arrived there (and coming in for
another gale on the way), I was brought to London,
and was laid up for more than two months at my
brother's house. All went well, however, I am thankful
to say, and towards the end of August I found I could
walk with 2 sticks very fairly.*

That was the end of his more active days, and
thenceforward, to use his own expression, "from a
* Letter to Rev. A. C. Smith, October 5, 1882.

280 LATER YEARS

three-legged I am become a four-legged man." Many
people would have been embittered by such a calamity,
but Newton was never heard to complain ; and he even
made light of it in writing to his brother Edward. No
man ever had his days more fully filled than were his.
Among his papers was found a printed form for the
publication of the first issue of " Who's Who," and
against the heading of Amusements was scribbled, in
his handwriting, " No time for any."

Happily, however, his double lameness did not keep
him a permanent prisoner at Cambridge, and for many
years he joined his friend, Henry Evans, of Derby, in
cruises about the British Islands.

Sir Archibald Geikie, who was his fellow-guest in
many of these cruises, writes : —

Year after year " Alfred the Great," as Evans used
playfully to call him, was received with open arms, not
only by his host, but by every member of the crew.
And no one could look forward with keener zest to these
holidays than Newton, when for some weeks he could
escape from the cares of University life to the firths and
sounds of the north and west of Scotland, where no
letters could reach him, even if he had left an address
behind him, which he was generally careful not to do.
Nowhere could he be seen to be more completely in his
element than on board of the Aster. He loved the sea
and its associations with such a sturdy affection that
inclemencies of weather, by no means infrequent in
those regions, never drew from him the least sign of
impatience, or seemed in any degree to disturb his
habitual cheeriness and his enjoyment of the cruise.
Clad in the light-grey tweed suit which did duty on
these voyages, but without top-coat or waterproof, he
would sit for hours on some exposed part of the vessel,
smoking innumerable pipes and watching for every
variety of sea-fowl that might show itself either in the

SIB A. GEIKIE'S RECOLLECTIONS 281

air or in the water. In the course of a few clays sun,
wind, rain, and salt spray told on his complexion, which
then assumed a ruddiness that would have astonished
the inmates of Magdalene College. The sharpness of his
eyesight in the detection of birds on the wiDg, even
when he had nearly reached the age of seventy years,
was always an astonishment to his companions. And
the enthusiasm with which each fresh form was greeted
by him as it flew overhead became infectious to all on
board. . . .

These cruises formed an important element in
Newton's life during his later years. He looked forward
to them with almost boyish exuberance and delighted
afterwards to recount their varied incidents. They not
only provided a healthful and delightful holiday, but kept
him still in close personal touch with birds, which had
been the main interest and study of his life. In spite
of the lameness which was understood to have been the
result of an accident during infancy, he was often the
first to enter the boat which had been got ready for a
landing on some surf-beaten rock, or for a closer inspec-
tion of the caves and stacks at the foot of a bird-
haunted precipice. On such occasions, so self-dependent
was he, he would gently repel offers of the assistance
which was always at his service. It was only when
the increasing feebleness of his limbs would have made
such assistance indispensable that he reluctantly gave
up the annual cruise.*

His first visit to St. Kilda was made in 1887 :—

The general sight is magnificent, but I have seen
taller cliffs and cliffs more full of birds in Spitzbergen.
I think the St. Kilda minister is a very good fellow,
but I wish he would stop the cruelties that the lambs of
his flock perpetrate on innocent young birds, which
they bring away and torture for their own amusement.
I was afraid it would be thought unmannerly or I should

* Sir Archibald Geikie, P.R.S. Proceedings of the Royal Society,
B. vol. 80, 1908.

282 LATER YEARS

have liked to use my stick on 2 or 3 boys, besides,
not knowing the laws of the country, I might have
brought them down upon me.*

In 1891 they went up through the Minch to Orkney,
thence to several outlying skerries and to the Flannans,
west of Lewis.

I write to report our return from a charming cruise,
though we saw nothing of any great importance and
performed no great achievement. The 2nd day after
our arrival here Evans took us over to Oronsay for the
afternoon. I wish we had had the whole day there, for I
should like to have searched some of those kitchen-
middens, and indeed I failed to find the one which
Grieve depicts. If he had only given a map instead of
a useless figure it would have been better. We found
one that had been cut into, but from his description it
can't be that in which he got the Great Auk bones. I
made some notes upon it which I can send you if you
think they will be of any use to you, but I fear they
are worthless. We saw the usual birds, but nothing
more. Next day we started for the north, and got up
to the skerries on Sunday, the cliffs looked as grand as
ever, and so did the Eagles, both of which we saw
sitting and for a good long time, one on each side of
the nest. I believe I saw a young bird in it, but
neither Evans nor my brother go so far as that —
though both agree as to its being the nest. We had
your book in the boat with us and went to the very spot
where your photographer must have stood, but thence the
sight of the eyry is not visible, being round the corner of
the first projection. On this we all agreed. Your photo-
grapher has " distanced " the rest of the cliff more than
he ought, I suppose to increase its picturesqueness. We
were in the boat or on the rocks on that side for more
than 2 hours, having the Eagles in view most of the

* Letter to J. A. Harvie-Brown, July 29, 1887.

SUMMER CRUISES 283

time. We saw no Falcons, as we did last year, neither
did Evans when he was there some ten days before, and
we fear the gamekeeper, who told him some time ago he
was going over from Lewis, may have done for them.
Though the Eagle's nest is to all appearance inaccessible,
being well overhung, anybody might kill the birds with
a rifle, and I consider their existence most precarious.

The next day we were off to N. Rona. There the
sea was calm, but there was a good deal of swell, and
though I believe I could have got into the boat without
any risk, my brother begged me not to try it. I there-
fore stayed on board contenting myself with looking at
what J. Wolley used to consider the land of promise, and
admiring the accuracy with which you have depicted it.
Your view is really excellent. Evans went ashore and
stayed for some time, and my brother rowed backwards
and forwards along the rocks, while the yacht kept off
and on. Evans reported a pair of Falcons, but nothing
else more than the usual birds. The landing was easy
and I am very sorry I did not go. Of course there was
a great surf on the other side. Then we stood away to
Suleskerry, where we made no attempt to land, but I
suppose there would have been no real difficulty in
getting ashore or coming off had anything been to be
gained by it.

I think there must be more Gannets there than on
Stack (perhaps twice as many), but, as Evans says, you
might add or subtract the whole lot from those at
St. Kilda without noticing the difference. After looking
the rock well over with our glasses we turned southward
and reached Loch Roagh in Lewis where we lay that
night. Such a piping hot day it was, the sea like satin
but a fair swell upon it, and a good deal of haze ; sun
setting like a ball of copper and the moon rising like
another.

Tuesday morning we were off to the Flannan Islands
which delighted all of us ! There was a bit of a swell,
but one could have landed almost anywhere, and we
boated in and about them for a couple of hours. No

284 LATER YEARS

Pomatorhine Skua or Wild Geese, however, gladdened
our vision, and except a Corvine bird which just showed
itself and then disappeared, there was nothing beyond
the ordinary sea-birds. Evans has a great fancy for
going into caves, and his fancy would here have perhaps
tired itself, for they seem endless, but after some four
or five I suggested that the open air was certainly
sweeter and the chance of being splashed by the Shags
and their companions not greater. I think these islands
might repay you for another visit, if you had the luck
to hit off quiet water. It seems to me (from the good
look we had at them in so many directions) quite clear
how they came to be called the " Seven Hunters." The
Eastern group consists of two pairs of sizable islands
making four islands, and the Western of one pair, and
the most western stack of all, which stands so distinctly
from the rest both in position and outline, the latter
very like Levenith in St. Kilda, of which it is a sort of
miniature. We went very close round this, hoping we
might find a Gannet or two on it, but could see none.
There were plenty about, and Fulmars also, but I think
they were not "at home" there. By the way, Evans
quite believes in the Fulmar breeding on N. Rona, as he
saw one or more on the land.

From the Flannans we came to Shillcy Sound,
intending to go next day to the Outer Hysgeir, but
the sea began to tumble about and it became evident
in the morning that if we went we could not land there,
so we came back through the Sound of Hamir to Braca-
dale, starting next day for Loch Skavaig and Coruisk,
and so to Oban. There we had to coal, and on Friday
returned to Jura. Yesterday we went round the Loch
Tarbet of this island, where we found a jolly lot of seals —
all vitulina. By the way, we saw some fine grey seals
at Oronsay, N. Rona, and the Flannans, very tame at
the latter, and one huge monster let us get quite close
to him before he wriggled off his rock.

To-morrow we are off for the south, and if we have
done nothing towards adding to the knowledge of birds

HEBRIDES 285

we have (or at least I have) had a very enjoyable holi-
day, and I shall be able to go back to work refreshed.

I went into Scott's, the bird-stuffer at Oban, and saw
there a Diver which I advised him to show to you the
next time you call upon him. I don't say it is, but it
looks as if it might be a young example of Colymbus
adamsi. It is a wretchedly mounted thing, and has the
tip of its bill damaged by shot. He said it was got in
those parts (Sound of Mull, I think), and if so you
might like to compare it with a C. glacialis of the
same age, for I forget if it has a whitish bill or not.
This specimen certainly has.

Evans says he was at Hychier off Canna about three
weeks ago and found only some half a dozen Terns
there, but no sheep. Those that were put on the island
last and destroyed the Ternery did badly, the owner
losing more than half. Serve him right !

I have been always looking out for a collision with
the Shiantelle and am sorry it did not come off. Write
to me at Cambridge.

P.S. — Off the Flannans we had a distant view of
St. Kilda and Barra.*

The Shiantelle was Mr. Harvie-Brown's yacht, in
which for many years he made cruises about the Scottish
coasts and islands, collecting additional material for his
volumes on the Fauna of Scotland. During this year's
cruise he had planned to meet the Aster about the
Orkney Islands, but for some reason the scheme mis-
carried, and he consoled himself by writing the " Song of
the Shearwater," which he sent to Newton.

PUFFINUS GRAVTS.
Carmen Harveio-Brunneanum, more Kiplingiano.

By the old North Rona chapel, looking southward to the sea,
There's a Shearwater a-sittin', an' I know she thinks o' me ;

* Letter to J. A. Harvie-Browa, June 28, 1891.

286 LATER YEARS

For the wind is in the sea- pinks, aii' the Herrin' Gulls they say,
" Get you back, you Scottish reiver ; get you back to Miugulay !

Get you back to Miugulay !

Where the old Shiantelle lay,
Can't you 'ear 'er chains a-rattlin' from Oban to Mingulay ?

On the road to -Mingulay,

Where the whales an' dolphins play,
An' the dawn comes up like thunder outer Skye to stop all day ! 'f

'Er plumage was that mottled as she sot upon the green,
She looked a perfec' beauty jus' the same as Sheba's queen,
An' I seed 'er first a-broodin' a whackin' piece o' loot,
A big white egg a-wastiu' right underneath 'er foot,

Bloomin' egg as white as chalk,

't would make collectors walk
Plucky distance for to see it ; if they got it, 'ow they'd talk !

On the road to Mingulay !

(Hiatus valde deflendus.)

Ship me somewhere north of Lewis, though the weather be accurst,
Where the decalogue's not in it, and the decapod * comes first ;
For the Herrin' Gulls are callin', and it's there that I would be,
By the old North Eona chapel, sloping southward to the sea.

On the road to Mingulay,

Where the old Shiantelle lay,
With the mushrooms 'neath the sunshine, gleaming white on Mingulay,

On the road to Mingulay,

Where the whales an' dolphins play,
An' the dawn comes up like thunder outer Skye to stop all day !

Iii June, 1893, they made a cruise to the Outer
Hebrides and to the Orkneys, where Newton visited one
of the famous haunts of the Gare-fowl.

I had a delightful fortnight in Scottish waters,
afloat about ten days, and the weather, except for
24 hours, everything that could be desired. Even
that break had its benefit, for it made all the rest
the more enjoyable, and was not so very bad while it
lasted. I was carried through and around Orkney,
close alongside of the Holm of Papa Westray, where
Great Auks used to breed ; our good H.-B. and
Buckley did not appreciate that fact, and like the
celebrated Levite, passed by on the other side.

* " The lobsters of the Oute* Hebrides are first-rate." On this point
all voyagers- agree, from the veueiable L>r. Johnson to the present time. —
J.A.H.-B

SIR EDWARD NEWTON 287

Nevertheless, I accord to H.-B. all the honour and glory
of identifying the spot where the last bond Jide British
Great Auk was slain, and the print from the photograph
in the " Orkney " volume is marvellously good.

We spent a peaceful Sabbath at the Shiants, the
third time I have been to that heavenly spot. But to
see the effect of the drought even there ! What had
always been banks of glowing green (on which the
Puffins looked like daisies) was this year of a hair-
brown.*

His last cruise was in 1899, when the Aster went
all round the coast of Ireland.

It was about this time that Newton suffered the
greatest loss of his lifetime by the death of his brother,
Sir Edward Newton, in April, 1897. Edward was
three years younger than Alfred, having been born in
1832. All his life he was an ardent naturalist, and he
began to contribute notes to the Zoologist at the age of
twelve and a half.

He was almost equal to a warrener in the way he
could find nests by watching the birds, or making them
show him where their nests were. There are now
several men who can do this, and have done it,
probably better than he ever did, but I think he was
the first naturalist who ever brought this into practice
— and it was for the love of watching the birds and
learning their ways, much more than with the object of
taking their eggs, that he did it.f

From Cambridge, where he graduated in 1857,
Edward Newton went into the Colonial Service, and
was successively Assistant Colonial Secretary, Auditor-
General, and Colonial Secretary of Mauritius ; after-
wards he was Lieutenant-Governor and Colonial

* Letter to Col. H. W. Feilden, August 14, 1893.
t Letter to H. B. Tristram, May 20, 1897.

288 LATER YEARS

Secretary of Jamaica. He was created C.M.G. in 1875,
and K.C.M.G-. in 1887. Daring his service in Mauritius
he discovered no fewer than twenty-seven new species
of birds living in Madagascar, the Comoros, and Mas-
carene Islands, and he took an active part in the dis-
covery of remains of the Dodo, Solitaire, Aphanapteryx,
and other extinct birds of Mauritius and Rodriguez.
He retired in 1883 to a house at Lowestoft, whence he
often made visits to his brother at Cambridge.

The loss is one from which I can never recover, and
it is one which has at once made me feel ten years
older. We had absolutely identical tastes and pursuits
throughout fifty years and more, though we were often
separated for years.*

To say that he felt ten years older was no idle
phrase. His friends remarked a definite change in the
Professor, and thenceforward, though his age was only
sixty-eight, he seemed to have become suddenly, as
some men do, an old man. He was still, for several
years to come, a familiar figure in the streets of
Cambridge ; if the four-wheeled cab took him to the
Museums in the afternoon, he walked back to Magdalene
whenever it was fine. And that was a progress that
one will never forget ; the tall old man — bent as he
was, he certainly stood six feet — dressed in an old-
fashioned black tail-coat, light grey trousers, and black
stove-pipe hat, or in summer a high-crowned felt hat
of pale grey. White hair and whiskers and keen
bright eyes that seemed to be fixed on the horizon ; but
he was quick to see a greeting from a passer-by, and he
was amazingly dexterous in transferring a stick to the
other hand in order to salute a lady. He had a strong
dislike of the Cambridge tramcars, and objected to

* Letter to G. E H. Barrett-Hamilton. June. 1897.

PORTRAITS 289

their being taken along the King's Parade. Often on
his way from the Museums he would walk down the
middle of the street from Benet Street to Market Hill
deaf to the tinkling bell behind him ; speed mattered
little to the old horse-drawn trams of Cambridge, and
he hardly lived to see the day of motor 'busses.

Two attempts were made to paint his portrait. The
first was by the distinguished artist Charles Furse, who
both in his origins and in his tastes had much in
common with Newton, but for some reason they failed
to get on together, and the picture was never finished.

For the last five days I have been surrendering my
body wholly to my Apelles, and I fear that his job is
not much more than half done. Some people think
that the result will be satisfactory ; but for my own
part I as yet fail to recognise in the performance any
trace of the expression of chastened resignation which
I know I wear while the process is going on, and I sit
staring at a blessed gas bracket, which is the object
chosen for me to fix my eyes upon. However, I occa-
sionally cast furtive glances at some papers that lie
before me, and thus the whole of the 20 hours the
operation has so far taken has not been wholly wasted,
for I have to some extent revised the MS. " Birds of
Sussex," which good old Borrer submitted to me.*

He complains later (June 14) that the " thorny
Furse has made my hand look like an overgrown
baby's — fat and fubsy, which may be artistic, but I
know to be untrue."

The second portrait was painted by Mr. Lowes
Dickinson, and was considered good enough to be
hung in the Combination Room at Magdalene.

Honours came to him late in life : he had been
elected F.R.S. in 1870. In 1900 he was awarded one

* Letter to LoH Lilford, May 31, 1890.

U

290 LATER YEARS

of the Royal Medals of the Royal Society and the Gold
Medal of the Linnean Society. He also held the dis-
tinction of being a Vice-President of the Royal and
Zoological Societies. An old friend of his, and a friend
also of Darwin and of Wallace, wrote to him : —

December 21, 1905.

DEAR PROFESSOR,

I cannot refrain from sending you a line this
Christmas. I am now in my ninetieth year and may
never have another opportunity. Though I have not
had the pleasure of seeing you lately, I am always
hearing you spoken of and invariably with esteem and
regard. Every one honours Newton, and none more
sincerely than,

Yours most truly,

W. B. TEGETMEIER.

About the same time, November, 1905, he had a
bad fall in coming out of Hall ; it shook him seriously
and he was never the same again. But he did not give
up his work ; he was then finishing off the " Ootheca
Wolleyana," and he began already to make plans for
the future.

It will indeed be a great pleasure to me to get this
[" Ootheca Wolleyana "] done, and if I only keep my life
and faculties I ought to be able to do it. Then there
is the Gare-fowl business to which I am pledged if
possible, and though that will mean a great deal of
work I am not without hope of managing. Beyond
that I dare not look ; but there are over 50 years' notes
on the " Bustard in Britain " to solace my second child-
hood, if that should come about. At any rate I am
not wanting in occupation if I live another ten years.*

The last word of the " Ootheca " was written on
November 20, 1906, and the final part was published

* Letter to G. E. H. Barrett-Hamilton, September 27, 1905.

LAST ILLNESS 291

in the Spring of the following year. The Professor
continued to keep up his frequent correspondence with
a number of friends ; his memory was unimpaired and
his interest in other people's doings was as keen as ever
it was, but he was not fit for further work. In May,
1907, he was beset by a serious attack of dropsy, his
first real illness in seventy-eight years, and he tried to
look upon it in his customary philosophical way.

I am sorry to say I have been laid up now for some
weeks with a most obstinate dropsical attack, which
defies the strongest drugs the doctors have been dosing
me with. I am almost thinking of sending to Holland
for a Dutch engineer to come and drain me, after which
he can turn his hand to our Fens, where I hear there are
just now hundreds of acres under water — whether due to
the bursting of a bank I do not know.*

A few days later, when he knew that his illness
would be his last, he wrote to Mr. Harvie-Brown :-

M.C.C.,

May 29, 1907.

MY DEAR H.-B.,

For the first time in my life I find myself
writing to you as a serious invalid, for though my
doctor professes to be hopeful of the result, I can't say
that I feel so at all, but that a stubborn attack of
dropsy which took me some weeks ago means to carry
me off. I am thankful to say that so far it is not
attended by any pain — though from weakness there is
considerable amount of inconvenience, which must be
expected — but I have much — very much — to be thank-
ful for, and indeed have received blessings innumerable.
I wish I could have lived to tell " The Story of the
Gare-fowl" and "The Bustard and Britain," for which
I Ijave laid in a vast stock of material, but perhaps

* Letter to W. Eagle-Clarke, May 21, 1907.

292 LATER YEARS

some one else may be found to use it efficiently. I think
a nice book could be made out of each batch.

As to myself I trust I am sufficiently thankful, for
I have had a life to be thankful for. I have known
some of the best of men whom I could know, and what
is more have been on the best terms of friendship with
them, and it has certainly pleased Grod to bless me in
countless ways and particularly in my Natural History
acquaintances, both at home and abroad. By a most
wonderful combination of circumstances I came in for
the Travelling Fellowship of this College — the only thing
of its kind, and the very thing that suited me ! Then
again, by a like wonderful chance, the newly founded
Professorship of Zoology in the University fell to me !
If it had been worth more some better man would have
tried for it and got it. But it was just what I wanted,
and though many others would have done much more
with it, I am not sure that the study of Zoology in the
University would have been thereby really helped.

So God bless you,

ALFRED NEWTON.

A few days before the end an old friend, Mr. J. J.
Lister, went to see him when he was in great distress.
" I have had a very happy life," he said.

The evening before he died the Master was sent for.
A prayer was said and then the Professor wished him
good-bye. " God bless all my friends — God bless the
College — and may the study of Zoology continue to
flourish in the University." A little later — his breath-
ing was very laboured and he could speak only with
difficulty — he asked to be lifted up. "I must die in my
chair, like dear Bradshaw." So, on June 7, 1907, he
died.

CHAPTER XVII

MISCELLANEOUS LETTERS

THE following letters written to and by Newton,
dealing with various subjects, which do not find a place
in the foregoing chapters, are arranged in order of date.

From John Wolley to A.N. :-

Muonioniska,

November 15, 1853.

Ludwig Knoblock tells me the following as a Finnish
story. Kiowroo (one of the names of the devil, for he
has very many in Finland) had taken a lad as drang
for one year, a lad of seventeen years of age and very
clever. Kiowroo was somewhat jealous of him, and
would constantly have wagers with him which could do
things best.

One day they agreed to see which could bear the
heavy trunk of a tree furthest without setting his end
to the ground. They agreed that whoever had the
small end must go first, and if he looked back the other
might poke him in the eye besides winning the wager.
The boy said he was quite ready to take the large end,
so off they started. But they had not gone far before
the lad slipped his share upon the ground and sat upon
it ; Kiowroo suspected something but he durst not look
back for the lad called out that he had a sharp spike
ready for his eye in case he turned his head. At last he
could go no further and began to say it was wonderfully
heavy, but the lad declared he did not feel it at all.
Presently he could not stand it any longer, but let his
end drop : and before he dare look round the lad was
on his legs with the tree upon his shoulder. So the
devil lost that wager.

Another day they were to try which could drive his

293

294 MISCELLANEOUS LETTERS

head hardest against a tree. The boy slipped away
and cut a hole in a tree just so deep as half his head,
and covered the place with bark. When the trial came
off the boy tried first, and his head was buried down to
the eyes in the wood. The devil came after and
smashed off a great piece of bark with the wood under
it, but his head went nothing like so deep as the lad's,
so he lost that wager too.

Next they had a dispute which could throw highest
an enormous hammer. The devil cast it to the roof of
a high room, but the drang waited a little ; and the
devil said, "Go on." The lad replied: "I am only
•stopping till that black cloud comes overhead, that I
may throw it upon it." The devil said : " Nay, nay, my
father's old hammer, I will pay you the money rather."

Down, Bromley, Kent, S.E.,

January 19, 1867.

MY DEAR SIR,

Will you have the kindness to give me some
information on one point? Not long since I was
speaking to Mr. Wallace about his mimetic butterflies,
and I told him of the case of the Khynchcea, of which
the female is more beautiful than the male, with the
young resembling the latter. He answered me that
you at Nottingham had advanced this or some such
case, and that you had simply explained it by the
male being the incubator. I should be extremely
obliged if you would give me any information on this
head and allow me to quote you. The subject interests
me greatly, as in the 4th Edition of the " Origin " I gave
the obvious explanation of female birds not being
gaudily coloured, etc., on account of their incubating ;
1 knew then of the Rhyncluxa but passed over the case,
from not having space and from its appearing to me
quite inexplicable.

I hope that you will forgive me troubling you, and
believe me, my dear Sir,

Yours sincerely,

CHARLES DARWIN.

CHARLES DARWIN 295

P.S. — As I am writing, I will ask one other ques-
tion, for the chance of your being able to answer it.
Does the male black Australian swan, or the black and
white S. American swan, differ from the females in
plumage ? i.e. in the intensity of the black, or in the
amount of black in the black-necked species ?

Down, Bromley, Kent, S.E.,

March 4, 1867.

MY DEAR SIR,

Very many thanks about the Dotterel, and I
am pleased to hear of this additional evidence. I have
looked to Swinhoe's papers, but the case does not seem
very conclusive. After writing to you I remembered
that the female of the Carrion -hawk of the Falkland Fs.
(formerly called Polyborus N. Zealandii] is very much
brighter coloured than the male, as I ascertained
(" Zool. Voyage of Beagle: Birds") by dissection; I
have written to the Missionaries there about its
nidification and if I receive any answer, will in-
form you.

The other day I thought I had got a case at the
Zoological Gardens in the Casuar'mus galeatus, in
which the female has the finest and brightest caruncles,
etc., but Sclater tells me it would be rash to trust to
the comparison of a single pair, and he tells me that
the male Ostrich has the finest plumes.
With my best thanks,

I remain my dear Sir,
Yours very sincerely,

CHARLES DARWIN.

P.S. — Mr. Blyth tells me that according to Jerdan
the natives say the male Turnix alone incubates and
attends to young.

There is another consideration which might lead to
the female being the most beautiful, viz., if they were
the more numerous than the males and the species were
not polygamous, for in this case the more beautiful
females would be selected.

296 MISCELLANEOUS LETTERS

Eversley Rectory, Winchfield,

April, 1867.

MY DEAR NEWTON,

Terrible hard work — and a sad death in our
family, have prevented my thanking you and John
Clark for your kind correction of my lecture.

I am very glad to know what the Bearded Tit feeds
on and that it is not a Shrike. But most thankful am
I for your guess at ficedulse. It is proof of high
critical power — you should take to editing Greek
plays.

I knew Jicedulse was " beccaficos." But thought the
French used it for Wheatears and other little birds.
But picedulse is a delightful correction. But " hawks "
for " auetes " was the printer's error.

I am well pleased that you found so little fault with
the whole. I omitted the antiquity of man, and flint
implements : because it was unfair to commit good
Norman McLeod, who is a martyr already to his liberal
opinions, responsible for the discussing so great a subject
in a single paragraph.

Thank God, the birds are coming — which always
make my heart grow young again. Chiffchaff, wryneck,
wheatear, and garden warbler are here, and I am
straining my ears everywhere for that jolly little
feathered Bacchus, the black cap. I will see Stevenson's
" Birds of Norfolk." I was very sorry to hear of your
illness ; but I was told it was gout.

Ever yours obliged,

C. KINGSLEY.

London,

January 18, 1870.

DEAR NEWTON,

Can you inform me if there is any canal you
know of in your part of the country with a straight
piece (without locks) five or six miles long, or any
piece of water of that extent ? I have undertaken (for
a heavy wager) to prove by measurement the rotundity
of the earth, to one of those strange phenomena who

A. R. WALLACE 297

do not believe in it and who is willing to pay to be
enlightened.

Will you also give me your advice on another point ?
I am about to publish all my papers which bear upon
Natural Selection, etc., in a volume. I should like an
attractive title, but will not have a misleading one. I
have at present fixed upon " Contributions to the Theory
of Natural Selection. A Series of Essays," as exactly
expressing what the book will be. Macmillan has a
dislike to the word Contributions, and wants me to call
it " Essays on Natural Selection," or "On Natural
Selection ; a Series of Essays." But these indicate too
much a complete work on a definite subject to please
me.

Do you think my title will do, or can you suggest
anything quite different ?

Yours very faithfully,

ALFRED R. WALLACE.

A.N. to Edward Newton : —

Cambridge,

April 14, 1870.

He told me the day I got there that the digging
which Greenwell (he is a Canon of Durham and the
greatest resurrectionist in England) has been carry-
ing on for some years at Grime's Graves on Weeting,
behind Broomhill, had at last produced something, and
I made Newcome drive me over next day. Last year I
went there but there was nothing to be seen but a great
number of depressions (about 200 they say) like ordinary
disused stone pits.

All the old antiquaries have always said that these
were the remains of an ancient British village or town ;
but Greenwell found the country all round, and particu-
larly on the Brandon side, so covered with old worked
flints that he was sure that the depressions were the
remains of pits made in the old time to get flint. It
now appears that he was I'ight, and 1 don't know

298 MISCELLANEOUS LETTERS

when I have been more interested than with the results.
At the beginning of last week, after he had been digging
out the rubbish from one of these pits (he began 3
years ago, but of course only worked occasionally) and
had got down by the side of the solid chalk about 39
feet, he found a horizontal opening ; clearing this he
found it was the entrance to a gallery, or rather series
of galleries, and these he has since been clearing out ;
for the makers of these galleries, after they had got
what they wanted, seemed to have filled in some of
them with the chalk they excavated from the others — of
course, to save the trouble of hoisting it to the top.
These galleries run in almost every direction, with only
enough between them to keep the roof from falling in,
and it is quite clear that the object with which they
were cut was to get at the " floor flint," a stratum
of the finest and hardest flint some 9 to 12 inches thick
which lies at that depth and is entirely removed from
the galleries. One of these is either 27 or 29 feet long,
and appears to have communicated with a similar shaft
now nearly filled up and forming the next depression,
and there seems a probability that the whole formed an
immense series of " pot-holes " (like those they used to
take rabbits in on the warrens). The gallery at the
entrance is nearly high enough to stand in, say 5 feet,
but it soon diminishes and the branches are not above
3 feet high, some of them less, so that the miners must
have lain on their side just as pit-men do now in the
collieries. But the best thing has to come ; these
galleries were all excavated with picks made of Stags'
horns ! more than a dozen of which have been found in
this one pit, among the rubbish or quite at the end of
the galleries. Whether this pit ever caved in and the
workers had to leave their tools one can't say, but
probably it was so. The next that is opened will
probably show ; for one cannot think that the picks
were of no value, some indeed arc quite worn, but the
others are quite fresh. The horns are longer than the
average fen horn, but not so big as those of the drift.

FLINT PITS 299

A few splinters of flint are found, but very few,
showing how careful the men were about every morsel
of it they broke off, and one rough flint axe or " celt."

The big and royal antlers are broken off the horns
and then you have a capital pick. Nearly all the horns
are naturally shed, there were, I think, only 3 taken
oft" dead deer, and this is curious, for however abundant
deer may have been, it is notorious that the finding of
shed horns is a rarity. I got a very good pick which
was found and brought " to bank " while I was there ;
it has been much used, the point blunted and hammer
end worn by use.

Of other " works of art " I saw several shallow cups
cut out of chalk, which it is suggested may have been
used as lamps. I went down the ladder and into one
gallery ; the pick marks on the walls and roof are as
plain and fresh-looking as possible and Greenwell
declares some of the picks have thumb or finger marks
(showing the grain of the skin) in the fine chalk with
which they are now encrusted. There is no doubt about
the existence of these marks, but I found I could make
them for myself and I doubt their being impressions of
the skin of their ancient proprietors.

Altogether the discovery is very wonderful, and I
hope other people will go to work and open some more
pits. You may fairly give them an age of 2000 years,
for it is clear that metal was unknown at the time.

Greenwell is convinced that if more pits are opened
they will find the skeleton of some ancient miner who
was overwhelmed by a fall ; it is very likely, and I hope
the search will be continued, but Angerstein as you
know is a queer customer and it is impossible to say
what crotchet he may have.

A.N. to J. A. Harvie-Brown : —

Bloxworth, Blandford,

August 29, 1876.

I am very glad to have your confirmation of my
opinion as to there being dialects in the song of birds.

300 MISCELLANEOUS LETTERS

I believe that the notion first occurred to me the first
day I ever landed in Norway. This was at Christiansand
in May, 1855, and I was immediately struck with the
songs of the Eedstarts and Wheatears sounding
differently from those I had been hearing only a few
days before at home. I thought, however, that some of
the difference might be due to rocky localities in which
I heard the Norwegian birds, and I am now not sure
that in some cases this may not have something to do
with the difference in tone, especially if the sound does
not strike one's ear directly but is reflected from stones
or rocks.

Still I am quite inclined to believe that part of the
difference at least is actually local and I see no reason
why the notes should not vary. The case of your
particularly full-voiced Redwing might be an individual
peculiarity, for every one must have observed what a
difference there is between the song of one Song-Thrush
and another. I should say that I never heard two sing
exactly alike, and it is easy to recognise the same bird
clay after day, not to say season after season. Of all
our birds this difference is perhaps most easily noticed
in the Song-Thrush on account of its loud notes and the
abundance and familiarity of the species ; but I have
noticed it nearly as conspicuously in the Nightingale and
also decidedly with Skylark and Blackbird, I believe
also in the Chaffinch, Willow-Wren and some others.
If then there be, as there certainly is, this individual
difference, it is not unnatural to suppose that it may be
(like other individual differences) hereditary, and as
there must in the majority of cases be greater con-
sanguinity between (say) the Redstarts and Wheatears of
Christiansand than between the same birds in Suffolk
the matter seems capable of easy explanation. An ex-
tension of the principle will to some degree suggest a
reasonable theory of the " confusion of tongues " with-
out a Tower of Babel !

BLACKGAME. OWLS 301

A.N. to J. A. Harvie-Brown :—

10, Beaufort Gardens, S.W.

January 10, 1877.

It is quite a new notion to me that the Capercally
drives out the Blackgame. Without intimating any
doubt — because indeed I am not in a position to doubt
or to believe — I will, however, ask you to be fully satis-
fied that this is the case. I know how fond game-

O

keepers and others are of imagining that such or such a
thing has caused a diminution of game. Thus it has
grown to be a prevalent belief in Norfolk and Suffolk
that French Partridges drive away the grey birds. I in
former years had ample opportunity of seeing both
species and made pretty good use of it, and I am con-
vinced that the belief has not a particle of foundation.
Again I know from experience in Dorsetshire that in
some seasons Blackgame are unaccountably scarce and
in others unaccountably plentiful, and there there are no
Capercallies at all.

I am just returned from Brighton where I saw
Mr. Booth's collection. He seems to have murdered
several Eagles last spring at their nests !

Bloxworth, September 20, 1877.

DEAR LILFORD,

Concerning Owls : both last year and this I
have been exercised in regard to an Owl that comes and
hoots in trees near this house. On more than one
occasion last year my brother Edward and myself saw
a Barn Owl fly from a tree whence such hooting had
been heard but a few minutes before, and no Brown
Owl could be found in or flushed from the said tree. Is
it possible that after all the Barn Owl may hoot after a
fashion ; for I ought to say that this note is not the
regular " Tu-whit, Tu-whoo," but a wavering " whoo-
yoo-o-yoo-yoo," preceded and followed by horrid and
unholy shrieks ?

I won't have that Durham Canon arrogate " Tit-
mousen " to himself. He only heard it from me (vide

302 MISCELLANEOUS LETTERS

Yarrell, " Br. B.," ed. 4, i. p. 490, note). These same
birds are scarce with us this autumn. In the garden
here there are no honeysuckle berries, and not a Parus
palustris have I in consequence seen at a bower just
opposite my window.

Now that you remind me of it, I think that I too
have heard Titmousen cry in alarm when a Woodcock
has been on the wing. It must be an Owl they take
it for, and I know the Long-eared Owl preys at times
on small birds, so there is some ground for their
terror.

I believe I told you of my seeing 11 Blackgame
(9 in one field) one day about a week ago. I have
seen nothing of any importance since. I expect to be
making my start about this day fortnight.

Do you like eels ? I don't, but not exactly on the
ground assigned by a Yankee : " Do you think, sir, I'd
eat a darned damp snake ? '

Yours very truly,

ALFRED NEWTON.

P.S. — I ought to have said that the venison turned
out an unmixed comfort.

A.N. to Rev. A. C. Smith :-

October 31, 1878.

I fully expected that some of my friends would be
startled at the way I dealt with the Crows ; but I am
sorry to hear that you are distressed at it. I can only
say I was forced to it by the evidence, which I tried to
consider as fairly as possible. If I had any bias it was
to have things as they always have been, but the
evidence was too strong for me. Be sure, however,
that I shall not quarrel with those who don't see it as I
do, and, if I am not mistaken, to the "British Bird"
public the Black and Grey Crows will long stand as
distinct " species."

I thought I had said enough about Rook shooting.
As a " sport " it has no charms for me, but rather

ROOKERIES 303

inspires disgust. Still I am not sure that as regards
the welfare of the species the practice is detrimental.
It reduces the number of mouths to be fed and the
survivors must consequently thrive in proportion. If
there was no Rook-shooting we should doubtless have a
large emigration of young Rooks in autumn, and a
very small number of the emigrants would return in the
spring. As it is the emigration is hardly perceptible,
perhaps being no greater than the immigration in
spring.

The varied fortune of rookeries is indeed very
curious, and their waxing and waning would be a
wonderfully interesting subject to investigate ; of
course, in almost every case the supply of food is the
turning-point. We have, as I dare say you know, an
abundance of Rooks here, not, I am sorry to say, in the
garden of this College ; but from St. John's to Downing
is an almost continuous rookery so far as the presence
of trees admit. When I first knew Cambridge I think
there were two distinct establishments ; that in the
Johuian " wilderness," and that in the trees fronting
Cat's Hall. The former has spread in extent, though I
am not sure there are more birds, partly owing to many
trees having been blown down, and the latter certainly
has more nests than it used. There are nests at
intervals all along the backs of the Colleges as far as
Queen's ; so that really, as I have said, there is scarcely
any breach of continuity. Downing, too, is but a skip
and a flutter from Cat's, and since the Downing trees
have grown up, Rooks have taken to them immensely.
There is also a nest or two in the garden of Caius though
quite surrounded by buildings, and some at Sidney. I
wish we had some in our grounds, but I suspect our
trees are not to their liking.

July 24, 1879.
MY DEAR LlLFORD,

I had nearly omitted to notice your kind
offer of Flamingoes' eggs, for which I thank you much ;

304 MISCELLANEOUS, LETTERS

but unless they are from some new locality or possess
some other remarkable qualification, I will not trespass
on your bounty. I have specimens from Spain, France,
and India, and there is a " damnable iteration " about
them all. Why does not some one bring home a
Flamingo's nest ? the whole pillar of mud in which the
hen " s'assoit, comme Monsieur sur une vase " — as the
Frenchman told J. W. Clark. There is a deal of in-
teresting matter to be got out of this bird. How does
it collect the mud, and how heap it up ? To this day
the best authority on the subject is old Dampier,
who wrote more than 200 years ago. If the gentle-
men of England who go abroad at ease would look after
a few things like this they would cap their exploits,
which of course already surpass those of the orni-
thologists of any other nation.

Your hybrid Owl must be a really funny fellow.
Do pray have his portrait taken, and at least twice ;
once before he loses his first plumage, and then when
he gets his next suit. All young Owls, so far as I
know, have dark irides ; when he gets older he will
probably have them a half-and-half colour, something
between Bass and Guiness.

I went to Baker's to-day and saw the son (whom by
the way, I believe to be a good honest lad). I told
him his father was very foolish not to send you your
bird at once. He has had an Eagle of my brother's
some 8 or 9 years. It is always coming home next
week !

Yours very truly,

ALFRED NEWTON.

S.S. Ohu'worm, R.Y.S., Dartmouth,

August 8, 1883.

MY DEAR NEWTON,

Your information about Great Auk's egg is
correct, I saw it at Burton's ; a very fair good specimen
with a largeish fracture or irregular orifice at the small
end, which had been tolerably patched up ; it had the

LORD LILFORD 305

word " Pingouin," or part thereof, written ou it in two
places. I had a letter from Franck on 19th ult. saying
that the lowest price was £150, and that it was the
finest specimen in the world. I declined to buy, and
know no more about it except that Burton told me that
Franck had bought it for the Continent, and that I told
several people about it.

My doings since I last saw you are shortly told.
I went with my wife and youngest boy to Biarritz at
the end of January, stayed there much bored for about
three weeks and went on to Seville via Madrid about
the end of February. I had this vessel in the river,
but lived at pothouse, made several expeditions down
the river, but was much hampered during March and
early April by bad weather. We shot about 20 Great
Bustards, and nothing else worthy of remark except a
pair of Sterna Caspica, rare birds in those parts, never
met with before by self or Irby. Flamingoes were
more numerous than I ever saw them before, but at
their nesting time / was crippled by gout in the right
hand, not very severe but sufficiently so to prevent
any pleasure in locomotion, and I could not inspire
my boy to wade some two or three miles of mud and
water to the Lucio seal, which is no doubt the spot
where Abel Chapman tells in last Ibis of having seen
them on their nests. I joined my wife at Granada
towards the end of May, and came home thence by
Cordova, Madrid and Paris. Went to Neuevahn with
Irby at beginning of June, he caught several swallow-
tailed Flutter-bugs, P. podalirius, with his boy from
Darmstadt, and remained in apparently comparative
contentment for ten days. My wife joined me, we
found nest of Cyanecula wolji. I bathed, drank, and
came to London at the beginning of July, was detained
there by bad weather for several days. Did my
Fisheries ExtD several times as well as a bath-chairist
could. Met your brother there, the " worthy Magis-
trate," who told of your worthy self; and came down
here about three weeks ago. Weather and fishing

x

300 MISCELLANEOUS LETTERS

very indifferent, hardly any Kittiwakes now ou the
coast, a good many when we first arrived, but no pro-
pagation in these parts of that species. We shall be
going to Lilford about the middle of next week. Shall
I send you some venison ? And if so, whither ? Irby
has hired a shoot of some 4000 acres near Wimborne,
where he has a good breed of partridges, and expects
to slay snipes. There are a few Blackgame.

Let me hear how you are. I hope the rheumatism
has left you in peace of late.

Did you hear tell of a mourning friend at poor Jack
Eussell's funeral, who hearing a bystander remark that
the flowers, wreaths, etc., in the grave were very beau-
tiful, said, " Yez, it is very luvly, sheur enuf, but 1
rackon the dear old feller eud zeuiier lie in a vu-z brake."
My wife sends her very kind remembrances.

Yours very truly,

LILFOED.

S.S. Glowworm, E.Y.S., Dartmouth,

August 12, 1883.

MY DEAR NEWTON,

Thank you very much for yours of 10th to
hand yesterday. I should like to hear what becomes
of the egg of Great Auk. I would have given £100 for
it, but did not particularly care to make an offer.
I told Seebohn about it, but he did not seem
to rise.

About the killing of Otis tarda in Spain, I wanted
some choice specimens and as I found that there is now
a demand for them in Seville for culinary purposes,
besides a little French widow who buys all she can get
at 2$. for preserving and sending to Paris, thinks I that
we may as well have our share. With 3 exceptions all
that we shot were old males. There is no fear of the
extinction of the species in Spain, as the Marisma of the
Guadalquivir seems to be the only district in which
they are bullied by man to any extent, and with the
exception of a wandering Bonelli's Eagle they have

MISTLETOE 307

there no other enemies. We saw a very great number,
and they are very wide awake in the day time but
though no amount of driving and fair shooting will
materially affect the species, the demand aforesaid in
Seville has evoked a murderous practice of shooting them
with lantern and bell at nights, which is most destructive
to the male birds, but they are if not polygamous " muy
putaneros," as a young Spaniard said to me, and every
healthy old male treads every female that he can get at.

If you could spare the necessary time, there would
be little difficulty in seeing Phaenicopterus at his home
either in Spain or in Sardinia.

You are right in supposing that I blundered about
Cyaneuula ; those we found at Neuevahn were the
white-spotted race, which is apparently entirely un-
known to the natives of those parts.

We go to Lilford this week, when you shall promptly
have some venison. I do not know exactly whereabouts
Irby's shoot is, but I believe that Wimborne is his post
town. I have just heard of a nest of Hobby near Lilford,
but not on my own territory.

Yours very truly,

LILFORD.

December 20, 1890.

MY DEAR LILFORD,

It is the very Viscus berry itself that
T. viscivorus visits the tree opposite my window to
devour, the tree being an old apple with a fine growth
of Mistletoe upon it. In all the more than 26 years
that I have been here I have never seen any other bird
touch a Mistletoe berry save a Robin on one single
occasion ; but T. viscivorus clears them all off when
they are really ripe. This very morning there sat a
wretched Song-Thrush, with plenty of Mistletoe berries
over his head and around him, but he did not even look
at them, and so it always is. Yet the taste of this very
bird is adaptive enough to let him be greedy over pie-
crust.

308 MISCELLANEOUS LETTERS

We have now got a pretty deep snow, which I find
very uncomfortable, though the resources of civilisation
in the shape of " lawn-tennis soles " to my boots enable
me to get about more freely than before their in-
vention.

News I have none and I am almost compelled to
comment upon Mr. Parnell's doings, low as that form of
eking out a letter would be, but even there everything
that can be said on the subject has been said, and
novelty is impossible. Guillemard has sent me a copy
of his " Ferdinand Magellan " and I am charmed with
so much of it as I have read. The story is of itself
most interesting and it is capitally treated by him. I
feel quite glad that he had some of my books to work
with — especially as at last I have got them safe again.
Do you know anything of our Canon ? I wrote to him
some weeks ago asking if he really meant to go to the
Sandwich Islands, but have had no reply. It will be a
pity if he has contracted the modern habit of not
answering letters.

I yesterday had from a friend a bone which he had
found under a Golden Eagle's nest, and on taking it to
the Museum I discovered to my surprise that it was a
Shag's, and a young one at that — so the inference must
be that Golden Eagles rob Shags' nests, a rather curious
thing.

Wishing you, Lady Lilford and all yours the best of
wishes, believe me to be,

Yours very truly,

ALFRED NEWTON.

P.S. — Kiwis are too nocturnal, or at least crepus-
cular, to be entertaining — though years ago Wolley, my
brother Edward and I were much interested by watching
the first Apteryx that came alive to England for an
hour or two by the aid of a bull's-eye lantern. And we
stood the poor creature a drink, the first it had had
since its arrival and, so far as I could learn, the only
one it enjoyed during its long captivity. It was nice

CANON TRISTRAM 309

to hear it blowing bubbles through its nostrils, just
putting the tip of its bill in water.

A.N. to Canon H. B. Tristram : —

10, Beaufort Gardens,

December 29, 1890.

I had begun to be unhappy about you. There
seemed a possibility in these days of (asserted) noiseless
explosions that the Great Gun of Durham had gone off
silently, with intentions murderous to the peace of
Hawaiian birds, and that the Sandwich Island Com-
mittee might be startled to find that both bread and
meat were taken out of its mouth, and a flavour of
Durham mustard left only.

I thank you for your good wishes, and return them
to you and all yours ; but put not your trust in grand-
children being ornithologists or any of the rising
generation. The more promising they are as boys the
less likely are they to turn out worth anything. Think
of Lilford's youngest boy who was unhappy because he
was shaky on his " Grebes," and has now descended to
incredible baseness, even acting in a Greek play where
he had to call a Swan " redfooted " ! N.B., it could
not have been C. coscoruba and was hardly likely to
be C. davidi

Your voyage will not be so entertaining as Magel-
lan's (by the way, get Guillemard's new book * and
take it with you to read), but I hope less disastrous,
very delightful for a good sailor, but for sight seeing
nil nisi pontus et aer, as the old Latin grammar put it,
until you get to Japan, and then I expect you will be
much pressed for time. Convey my love to Mitsukuri
at Tokio, and another man there, a very nice fellow and
a botanist whose name at this moment I forget. He
came to Cambridge speaking American quite intelligibly,
but after he had been with us a little while he spoke
English so fluently that he ranallhiswordsintooneword-
andcouldn'tbyanymeansbeunderstood, perhaps he has

* " Ferdinand Magellan."'

310 MISCELLANEOUS LETTERS

now slowed clown a bit, in which case you will find him
very agreeable.

It really is a pity you can't come home by the
Sandwich Is. and stop the space of a steamer there ;
even Oahu, the island on which! Honolulu stands, has
not been worked, and I might tell you of a place there
where I think you would find a species of which only
one other specimen is known to exist, and that got more
than fifty years ago.

Magdalene College,

Cambridge,

October 14, 1895.

MY DEAR HARTING,

I am extremely obliged to you for sending
the Swan book,* and I will return it in a few days.
I have also to thank you for your letter received this
morning and the accompanying copy of your article on
" cob and pen/' which I am very glad to have. You
show abundant authority for the use of the words " cob "
and "pen," and I only wish I had known of it sooner.
But I cannot agree with you as to the meaning and
application of either. It is possible that " cob " may
refer to the " berry " on the cock Swan's bill, since the
word was used to signify any round substance, and in
that sense its diminutive (?) still survives in " cobble,"
a round stone such as roads are paved with.

But there was another signification ( = testiculus),
and as I find that a " cob horse " meant a " stone horse,"
I was inclined to think that a " cob swan " was a male
possessing the natural power of procreation. I would
refer you to the " New English Dictionary" (sub voce),
into which I much wish I had looked before my article
" Cob " was published.

All you say as to " Cop" is right enough, and as a
provincial word it has been known to me, in the sense

* " The Orders, Lawes, and Ancient Customes of Swanne. Caused to
be printed by John Witherings, Esquire, Master and Governour of the
Royall game of Swans and Signets throughout England. Printed by
August Mathewes, 1632." Sm, 4to, with Vignette of Swan on title page.
An exceedingly rare little volume.

FLINT JACK 311

of head, or crown, or crest, from my boyhood ; hut
though b and p are in many cases interchangeable, and
most likely " cob " and " cop " have a common origin,
yet I cannot think that " cob " would ever return to the
form " cop."

I do not think your explanations of " pen '; will
hold, and we shall have to look further to account for
it. Likely enough it is connected with penna, but
its special meaning as a hen swan seems still obscure.
I shall send the copy of your article to Skeat, and if he
can throw any light on the subject I will let you know.
Notwithstanding what you have written, and my own
suggestion now made as to " cob," I still think Yarrell's
second statement is unintelligible, though his first, on
your showing, is satisfactorily authorised. [See Diet.
Birds, art. " Cob".]

Yours very truly,

ALFEED NEWTON.

September 5, 1899.

MY DEAR HARVIE-BROWN,

I am afraid you will find it very hard to get
any specimens of Flint Jack's handiwork. You may be
sure that most of his victims threw them away as soon
as the fraud was exposed. Except John Evans * who,
I believe, has some, I cannot think of anybody of my
acquaintance likely to have any — and he would, not be
likely to part with them. I have certainly seen some
of Jack's forgeries in Museums — the Blackmore Museum
at Salisbury among others — but there they are kept for
a purpose, and would not be given up. I am not sure
that we may not have a few of the counterfeits in our
Antiquarian Museum at Cambridge. I remember some
one exhibiting some at a meeting of the Ray Club
about the time the matter was exposed, and I think
John Evans had a good deal to do with it. The story
is that he, or some one else, beginning to suspect Flint
Jack, drew on paper the form of a purely imaginary

* His are now in the Pitt Rivers Museum at Oxford.

312 MISCELLANEOUS LETTERS

implement, saying that such a specimen would be worth
a good bit of money. Jack is said to have looked at
the sketch and declared he had once come across a
thing like it which he had sold to a gentleman, etc.
The next time he came round he produced a flint corre-
sponding accurately with the drawing and claimed his
reward. The money was paid to him and he was told
how he had been entrapped ; but he saw the joke of the
thing and enjoyed it very much !

The trade of " flint-knapping " has been carried on at
Brandon time out of mind. The " floor-flint," as it
is thereabout called, produces the hardest and finest
quality, and I believe it is known that even before
gun-flints came into use, flints for common strike-a-
light purposes were manufactured there to a great
extent. In more recent times almost the whole supply
of gun -flints has come from that place, and a very
curious thing is that there is still a demand (only very
limited in these days) for them, but goodness knows
whence it comes and whither they go. . . . In that
neighbourhood it is not worth while to make forgeries ;
you can't do it properly with an iron hammer (as the
gun-flints are made) and the dull new surface is always
recognisable. It takes centuries to put on the proper
patina, and if polishing is attempted it is almost always
overdone. The best imitation is produced by rubbing
the fracture with a bit of cheese, but naturally that can
be as quickly removed by the finger, and then you
have the dull surface again. Besides this, in the majority
of cases the colour of the fracture is affected by age-
sometimes remarkably so.

Yours very truly,

ALFRED NEWTON.

A.N. to J. A. Harvie-Brown :-

Lowestoft,

November 17, 1900.

There must be plenty of analogies between the
migrations of Fishes and of Birds, yet I should suppose

A HARE'S WHISTLE 313

that there were also plenty of differences. I have always
felt that a good book on the migration of Fishes, both
salt-water and fresh, was much wanted.

A year or two ago a man wrote to me enquiring as
you now do about the vent feathers (under tail coverts
if you like it better) of the Blackcock. I could only
tell him that I knew nothing beyond the fact that they
are sometimes marked with black and sometimes not.
Never having lived in a Blackcock country my oppor-
tunities of observation have been nil, and I could not
find out that anybody, here or on the continent, had
explained or attempted to account for the variation ;
but I remember noticing the fact when a boy, in some
Blackgame sent to my father from Perthshire.

By way of starting a theory, to be kicked over if
need be, I should surmise that the young birds have
the bigger marks, the " T " or anchor shape, which
gradually lessens to the arrow-head, that to an " ermine "
spot and finally disappears. This is just the reverse of
the " return marking " on the Wax wing's pinions, for
they, I am pretty sure, are only seen in old birds, and
they seem to increase with age.

It would be a very pretty hare for you to start in
the " Scottish Annals " : this of Blackcocks' bottoms !

A.N. to G. E. H. Barrett-Hamilton :-

February 10, 1905,

Now I want you to tell me whether you have ever
heard, or heard of, a Hare's whistle, if I may so call it.
Do you know any one who has described it, and if so
who ? I believe I have heard it, but very rarely and
so long ago that my recollection of it is indistinct.
I think it is only uttered at night, and I suppose in
the rutting season ; but that I don't know.

The first time I heard it I had not a notion of what
it was, nor did I know for some time what animal it
came from, and then, so far as I remember, an old
warrener told me. I think the ordinary gamekeeper

314 MISCELLANEOUS LETTERS

knows nothing about it ; but then the ordinary game-
keeper is one of the most stupidly unobservant of
beings. Poachers, however, do know it and imitate it
with a " hare-call," one of which I should much like to
get hold of. None of the books in common use men-
tions it so far as I am aware, but there is nothing very
extraordinary in that ; for so very few people who
have written books know anything about the habits
of mammals beyond the most obvious facts, and accord-
ing to my recollection this cry, call, or whistle is so
shrill that it is possible some people could not hear it
at all. You know that many can't hear a Shrew, and,
it is said, scarcely any one over forty, a Bat.

A.N. to P. H. Bahr :—

July 5, 1906.

I know what a nuisance letter- writing is when " in
the field," and all the spare time one has is or ought to
be devoted to writing up notes, but I do like hearing of
people's existence especially when they are gone on a
venture which oneself has chiefly instigated.

You are perfectly right in your opinion of game-
keepers ; taking them as a lot they are as big a set of
fools as one ordinarily finds, but (and it is an important
" but ") there are some brilliant exceptions. I have had
nothing to do with crofters, but from all I have heard I
have a poor opinion of them. They may be picturesque,
but in every other but a sentimental view I am sure
the landscape would be better without them ; from the
economic point of view that is without doubt.

By the way, that white or whitish patch at the base
of the bill is not peculiar to the Scaup Duck, the Tufted
Duck often has it, not so conspicuously or well marked
as the other but quite enough to show. I have had
very little acquaintance with Scaup Ducks, almost none,
but it seems to me that if you are looking down on the
bird, even from a slight elevation, the very light-
coloured back ought to enable you to distinguish him

DUCKS' BACKS 315

at once from the dark-backed Tufted Duck, even though
the latter wears his white Hank-feathers so high that
they almost meet in the middle of the back. By the
way, did you ever notice a curious difference between
the Pochard and the Tufted Duck ? The former has a
complete " turtle back," while the latter has a well-
marked longitudinal depression running the whole
length of it.

If you have not noticed this, just look the next time
you are at the Zool. Gardens. I don't know how it is
with the Scaup or White-eyed Duck, perhaps betwixt
the two.

APPENDIX

LIST OF PUBLISHED PAPERS

NEWTON, A. Nestling of the Siskin (Fringilla spinus) in Confine-
ment. Zoologist, No. 120-1, Dec., 1852.

Some Account of a Petrel, killed at Southacre, Norfolk ;

with a Description and Synonymy. Zoologist, No. 120-1, Dec., 1852.

- Extracts from Letters of John Wolley, Esq., now in Lap-
land. Zoologist, p. 4203, Feb., 1854.

Psittaci novae Speciei ad conurum Genus Pertinentis

descriptio. 1859.

Remarks on the Harlequin Duck (Histrionicus torquatus,

Bp.). Zoologist, p. 162, 1859.

Memoir of the late John Wolley, Jun., Esq., M.A., F.Z.S.,

etc. The Ibis, 1860.

NEWTON, A and E. Observations on the Birds of St. Croix,
West Indies. The Ibis, 1860.

NEWTON, A. Note on the supposed Occurrence of the Hirundo
bicolor of North America in England. Proc. Zool. Soc., Feb. 28,
1860.

- On some Hybrid Ducks. Proc. Zool. Soc., June 26, 1860.

Remarks on the Anas (Anser) erythropus of Linnaeus.

Proc. Zool. Soc., June 26, 1860.

- Suggestions for saving Parts of the Skeletons of Birds.
Rep. Smithsonian Inst., 1860.

- Suggestions for forming Collections of Birds' Eggs. Smith-
sonian Misc. Coll., 1860.

Suggestions for forming Collections of Birds' Eggs. Re-
printed, with additions, from the Circular of the Smithsonian Institution
of Washington. London, 1860.

- Anweisung zur Anlegung von Eiersammlungen. (Trans.
by E. Baldamus.) Journ.f. Ornithologic, Nov., 1860.

- Description of a New Species of Water-Hen (Gallinula)
from the Island of Mauritius. Proc. Zool. Soc., Jan. 8, 1861.

- Particulars of Mr. J. Wolley's Discovery of the Breeding of
the Waxwing (Ampelis gnrrulus, Linn.). The Ibis, Jan.. 1861.

316

PUBLICATIONS 317

NEWTON, A. Abstract of Mr. J. Wolley's Researches in Iceland
respecting the Gare-Fowl or Great Auk (Alca impennis, Linn.). The
Ibis, Oct., 1861.

On the Possibility of taking an Ornithological Census.

The Ibis, April, 1861.

— — On the Possibility of taking a Zoological Census. Journ.
Proc. Linn. Soc., 1861.

Remarks on Pallas's Sand-Grouse (Syrrhaptes paradoxus)-

Proc. Zool. Soc., May 14, 1861.

- On a Hybrid Duck. Proc. Zool. Soc.,, Dec. 10, 1861.

— On some New or Rare Birds' Eggs. Proc. Zool. Soc.,
Dec. 10, 1861.

On the supposed Gular Pouch of the Male Bustard (Otis

tarda, Linn.). The Ibis, April, 1862.

On the Zoology of Ancient Europe. Read before Camb.

Philos. Soc., March 31, 1862.

Remarks on the Fringilla incerta of Risso. Proc. Zool.

Soc., April 8, 1862.

On the Breeding of the Nutcracker (Nucifraga caryo-

catactes). Proc. Zool. Soc., June 24, 1862.

— On the Discovery of Ancient Remains of Emys lutaria in
Norfolk. Ann. and Mag. Nat. Hist., Sept., 1862.

Review of the recently published Memoir of Bewick. The

Ibis, Oct., 1862.

Arctic Auguries. Ocean Highways, Feb. (?) 1862, (?) 1863.

— — On a New Bird from the Island of Madagascar. Proc.
Zool. Soc., Feb. 24, 1863.

- Two Days at Madeira. The Ibis, April, 1863.

On an Illustration of the Manner in which Birds may

occasionally aid in the Dispersion of Seeds. Proc. Zool. Soc,
April 21, 1863.

On Two New Birds from Madagascar. Proc. Zool. Soc.,

May 12, 1863.

Acclimatisation and Preservation of Animals. National

Review, No. 33, July, 1863.

Remarks on the Exhibition of a Natural Mummy of Alca

impennis. Proc. Zool. Soc., Nov. 10, 1863.

On the Breeding of the Green Sandpiper (Helodromas

ochropus). Proc. Zool. Soc., Dec. 8, 1863.

On the Irruption of Pallas's Sand-Grouse (Syrrhaptes

paradoxus) in 1863. The Ibis, April, 1864.

Notes on the Zoology of Spitsbergen. Proc. Zool. Soc

Nov. 8, 1864.

318 PUBLICATIONS

NEWTON, A. Notes on the Ornithology of Iceland. Appendix
to Baring Gould's " Iceland, its Scenes and Sagas." 1864.

On Two New Birds from the Island of Rodriguez. Proc.

Zool. Soc., Jan. 10, 1865.

- On some recently Discovered Bones of the Largest Known
Species of Dodo (Didus nazarenus, Bartlett). Proc. Zool. Soc.,
Feb. 14, 1865.

- Notes on the Birds of Spitsbergen. The Ibis, April, 1865.

On an apparently undescribed Bird from the Seychelle

Islands. The Ibis, August, 1865.

- The Gare-Fowl and its Historians. Natural History
Review, Oct., 1865.

- On a Remarkable Discovery of Didine Bones in Rodriguez.
Proc. Zool. Soc., Nov. 28, 1865.

List of Animals collected at Mohambo, Madagascar, by

Mr. W. T. Gerrard. Proc. Zool. Soc., Dec. 12, 1865.

NEWTON, A. and Others. Report on the Extinct Birds of the
Mascarene Islands. By a Committee consisting of Professor
A. Newton, Rev. H. B. Tristram, and Dr. Sclater. Report of the
Brit. Assoc., 1866.

NEWTON, A. On some New or Rare Birds' Eggs. Proc. Zool.
Soc., Jan. 24, 1867.

Zur Vogel-Fauna Spitzbergens. Journ. f. Ornith., xv.,

Mai, 1867.

- Supplement to a Report on the Extinct Didine Birds of
the Mascarene Islands. Rept. Brit. Assoc., 1867.

Remarks on Professor Huxley's Proposed Classification of

Birds. The Ibis, Jan., 1868.

NEWTON, A. and E. On the Osteology of the Solitaire or Didine
Bird of the Island of Rodriguez. Proc. Roy. Soc., No. 103, June,
1868.

NEWTON, A. The Zoological Aspect of Game Laws. Report
Brit. Assoc., 1868.

The Strickland Collection in the University of Cambridge.

The Ibis, July, 1869.

- On Existing Remains of the Gare-Fowl (Alca impennis).
The Ibis, April, 1870.

- On Cricetus nigricans as a European Species. Proc. Zool.
Soc., May 12, 1870.

- On a Method of Registering Natural History Observations.
Trans. Norfolk and Norwich Naturalists' Society, 1870-71 (1871).
pp. 24-34, 1871.

PUBLICATIONS 319

NEWTON, A. On some New or Rare Birds' Eggs. Proc. Zool.
Soc., Jan. 17, 1871.

Letter re Lagopus of Spitsbergen. The Ibis, April, 1871.

Exhibition of Eggs of German North-Pole Expedition.

Proc. Zool. Soc., June 20, 1871.

Eier. Die Zweite deutsche Nordpolarfahrt, vol. ii., (?) 1871.

On a remarkable Sexual Peculiarity in an Australian

Species of Duck. Proc. Zool. Soc., Nov. 7, 1871.

— — On an Undescribed Bird from the Island of Rodriguez.
27*6 Ibis, Jan., 1872.

Osteology of the Solitaire. (A Letter.) Ann. Mag. Nat.

Hist., Series IV., vol. ix., Jan. 10, 1872.

Osteology of the Solitaire. (A Letter.) Ann. Mag. Nat.

Hist., Series IV., vol. ix., March 9, 1872.

Second Supplementary Report on the Extinct Birds of the

Mascarene Islands. Report Brit. Assoc., 1872.

— The Notornis of Lord Howe's Island. 1873.

— On the Great Northern Falcons. Ann. Mag. Nat. Hist.,
Series, 1873.

On a Living Dodo shipped for England in the Year 1628.

Proc. Zool. Soc., June 16, 1874.

— Suggestions as to the Acts of Birds most proper to be
Observed by Meteorologists, Nov. 17, 1874.

- Manual of Zoology, published by the Society for Promoting
Christian Knowledge. 1874.

Additional Evidence as to the Original Fauna of Rodriguez.

Proc. Zool. Soc., Jan. 19, 1875.

Notes on Birds which have been found in Greenland.

Proc. Acad. Philadelphia, 1875.

Suggestions as to the Acts of Birds most proper to be

Observed by Meteorologists. Quart. Journ. Meteorological Soc.,
vol. ii., April, 1875. (N.B.— The paper mentioned above is
probably a mounted final proof of this paper.)

- Exhibition of Dutch Drawings of Dodo and other Extinct
Birds of Mauritius. Proc. Zool. Soc., May 4, 1875.

- Note on Palceornis exsul. The Ibis, July, 1875.

- On Certain Neglected Subjects of Ornithological Investi-
gation. Brit. Assoc., August, 1875.

- On the Assignation of a Type of Linnean Genera, with
especial reference to the Genus Strix. The Ibis, Series III., vol. vi.,
1875.

On some Ornithological Errors in the Rdiqtdce Aquitanicce .

Ann. Mag. Nat. Hist., Feb., 1876.

320 PUBLICATIONS

NEWTON, A. and E. On the Psittaci of the Mascarene Islands.
The Ibis, July, 1876.

- On the Naturalisation of the Edible Frog (Rana esculenla)
in Norfolk. (?) Zoologist, July, 1876.

- Address to the Biological Section of the British Association.
Glasgow, Sept. 6, 1876.

- The Dodo. Encylcopcedia Britannica, Ed. 9, June, 1877.

NEWTON, A. and Mrs. R. LUBBOCK. Letters relating to the
Natural History of Norfolk. Trans. Norfolk and Norwich Naturalists'
Soc., vol. ii., pt. 4. 1877.

— The Nomenclature of the Groups of Ratitae. Ann. Mag.
Nat. Hist., Dec., 1877.

- Stone in Solitaire. Proc. Zool. Soc., March 5, 1878.

— Zoological Geography — Didus and Didunculus. Two
letters in Nature, June, 1878.

NEWTON, A. The Rooks and London Rookeries. Zoologist,
Series III., vol. ii., Dec., 1878.

- Hawking in Norfolk. Lubbock's :c Fauna of Norfolk,"
2nd ed. 1878.

- Remarks on Death of Lord Tweeddale. Proc. Zool. Soc.,
Jan. 14, 1879.

On Alectorcenas nitidissima. Proc. Zool. Soc., Jan. 14,

1879.

- On some Moot Points in Ornithological Nomenclature.
Ann. Mag. Nat. Hist., August, 1879.

- More Moot Points in Ornithological Nomenclature. Ann.
Mag. Nat. Hist., Dec., 1879.

- On Chcetura Caudacuta. Proc. Zool. Soc., Jan. 6, 1880.

- List of the Birds of Jamaica. (Corrected proof.) July, 1880.
NEWTON, A. and E. List of the Birds of Jamaica. Handbook

of Jamaica (1881), 1880.

List of the Birds of Jamaica. Jamaica Handbook (1881).

1881.

NEWTON, A. On an Egg of Cariama cristata. Proc. Zool. Soc.,
Jan. 4, 1881.

- Protection of British Birds.

(1) Report on the Practicability of establishing " A Close
Time " for the Protection of Indigenous Animals, by a Com-
mittee appointed by the British Association, 1869-1880.
British Association Reports, London.

(2) The Wild Birds' Protection Act, 1880, with Explanatory
Notes. London (Field Office), 1880. Quarterly Review, vol. 151,
No. 301, Jan., 1881.

PUBLICATIONS 321

NEWTON, A. Note on the Generic Name Hypherpes. Proc.
Zool. Soc., March 15, 1881.

Footnotes to " Extracts from the Calendar of the Rev.

William Whitear, M.A., F.L.S., 1809-1826," by T. Southwell.
Trans. Norfolk and Norwich Naturalists' Society, vol. iii., 1881.

The White-Backed Woodpecker not a British Bird. (Cor-
rected proof, dated Sept. 20, 1881.) 1881.

• Ornithological Nomenclature. Addendum to The Ibis,

Jan., 1883.

Mr. Seebohm's " Fugitive Observations." (Cambridge,

May 19, 1883.) 1883.

The Fur-Seals of Commerce. A Monograph of the Seal-
Islands of Alaska. Quarterly Review, No. 312, Oct., 1883.

Memoir of the late John Scales. Trans. Norfolk and

Norwich Naturalists' Society, vol. iv., 1885.

Address to the Biological Section of the British Association.

Manchester, 1887. 1887.

Exhibition of a Stuffed Specimen of Bulweria columbina.

Proc. Zool. Soc., Nov. 15, 1887.

Darwin's Life and Letters. The Life and Letters of

Charles Darwin, including an Autobiographical Chapter. 3 vols.,
London, 1887. Quarterly Review, No. 331, Jan., 1888.

Early Days of Darwinism. Macmillan's Magazine, No. 340,

Feb., 1888.

On the Irruption of Syrrhaples paradoxus. Brit. Assoc.,

Section D., 1888.

The Irruption of Syrrhaptes paradoxus. Scientific News,

Sept. 10, 1888.

[Summary of Prof. Newton's Address to British Association —
" On the Irruption of Pallas's Sand-Grouse, Syrrhaptes paradoxus."]
Zoologist, Series III., vol. xxi., No. 142, Oct., 1888.

NEWTON, A. and E. Notes on some Species of Zosterops. The
Ibis, Oct., 1888.

NEWTON, A. On the Breeding of the Seriema (Cariama cristata),
Proc. Zool. Soc., Jan. 15, 1889.

On the Young of Pallas's Sand-Grouse (Syrrhaptes para-
doxus). The Ibis, April, 1890.

Obituary. Mr. J. H. Gurney. The Ibis, July, 1890.

Notes on some Old Museums. Annual Report of the

useums Association, 1891.

Errors concerning the Sanderling (Calidris arenaria) The

Ibis, July, 1892.

322 PUBLICATIONS

NEWTON, A. Note on the Occurrence of the Sanderling (Calidris
arenaria) in New South Wales. Records of Australian Museum, vol.
ii., 1892. 1892.

Remarks on Exhibition of Skin of an Immature Sylvia

nisoria. Proc. Zool. Soc., Nov. 1, 1892.

The " Russet-Pated Chough " of Shakespeare. Zoologist,

Oct., 1893.

- Origin of the Terms " Cob " and " Pen." 1893.

On a New Species of Drepanis discovered by Mr. R. C. L.

Perkins. Proc. Zool. Soc., Nov. 7, 1893.

On the Great Flood of 1852-3 in South-Western Norfolk.

Trans. Norfolk and Norwich Naturalists' Soc., vol. 5, 1893.

Notes on " A Bill to Amend the Wild Birds' Protection

Act, 1880." The Annals of Scottish Natural History, April, 1894.

Contributions to Pasfield Oliver's edition of Leguat's

"Voyage." 1891.

On a Rare Bird from the Sandwich Islands (Heterorhynchus

olivaceus). Proc. Zool. Soc., Dec. 15, 1896.

Sir Edward Newton, M.A., K.C.M.G. Obituary Notice.

Proc. Linn. Soc., Session 1896-97.

(?) NEWTON, A. Sir Edward Newton, M.A., K.C.M.G., F.L.S.,
C.M.Z.S. Obituary Notice. The Ibis, July, 1897.

NEWTON, A. On some New or Rare Birds' Eggs. Proc. Zool. Soc.,
Nov. 16, 1897.

The Preface to " Coloured Figures of the Birds of the

British Islands." Issued by Lord Lilford, F.Z.S., etc. 8vo.,
London, 1897.

On the Orcadian Home of the Gare-Fowl (Alca impennis).

The Ibis, Oct., 1898.

Obituary Notice. Osbert Salvin. Obituary Notices of the

Proc. Royal Soc., vol. 64, (?) 1898.

Gilbert White of Selborne. Born July 18, 1720 ; Died

June 26, 1793. 8vo., Cambridge, 1899.

The Great Shearwater in Scottish Waters. The Annals

of Scottish Natural History, July, 1900.

Gilbert White and his Recent Editors. Macmillan's

Magazine, No. 489, July, 1900.

Obituary Notice. Lionel William Wiglesworth. The Ibis,

Oct., 1901.

On some Cranes' Bones found in Norfolk. 1901.

Memoir. John Wolley. " Ootheca Wolleyana," vol. i.

On the White Rhinoceros. Proc. Zool. Soc., August 6,

1903.

PUBLICATIONS 323

NEWTON, A. Review of Evan's " Turner on Birds." The Ibis,
1903.

Leguat's Giant Bird. Fourth International Congress of

Ornithologists, Cambridge, June 20, 1905.

Books, Letters, and Papers Exhibited [by A. Newton] in the

Philosophical Library by permission of the Committee. June 20,
1905. Fourth International Congress of Ornithologists, Cambridge,
1905.

Remarks on Louis Bureau, " Sur un Atlas des Planches

coloriees de 1'Ornithologie de Brisson attribue au Peintre Martinet,
provenant de la vente Alph. Milne-Edwards." Proc. Fourth Inter-
national Ornithological Congress, 1905. 1905.

Alca impennis. " Ootheca Wolleyana," vol. ii., 1905.

Appendix. The Publications on Natural History of John

Wolley, except those included in the body of the Work. " Ootheca
Wolleyana," pt. iv., vol. ii.

PAPERS IN QUARTO.

NEWTON, A. On a Picture supposed to represent the Didine
Bird of the Island of Bourbon (Reunion). Trans. Zool. Soc., vol. vi.,
1867.

NEWTON, A. and E. On the Osteology of the Solitaire or Didine
Bird of the Island of Rodriguez, Pezophaps solitaria (Gmel.). Phil.
Trans. Roy. Soc. 1868.

NEWTON, A. The Zoological Aspect of Game Laws. Seems
to be an extract from a Paper of Professor Newton's. Paper read
at meeting. Brit. Assoc., August, 1868. 1868.

The Migration of Birds. Nature, Sept. 24, 1874.

On the Species of Hypsipetes inhabiting Madagascar and

the Neighbouring Islands. Ornithological Miscellany, p. 41, 1876.

Der Kukuk (I. and II.). Ornithol. Centralblatt, Feb. 1

and 15, 1878. Jahrg. III., 1878.

Der Dodo. Ornithol. Centralblatt, Sept. 1 and Dec., 1878.

Jahrg. III., 1878.

NEWTON, A., and PARKER, W. K. Birds. Encyclopedia Britan-
nica, 9th ed., (?) 1875.

NEWTON, A. Ornithology. Encyclopedia Britannica, 9th ed.,
vol. xviii., 1884.

Visitations of the Rotche or Little Auk. Science Gossip,

vol. ii., No. 13, March, 1895.

324 PUBLICATIONS

REPORTS OF COMMITTEES.

Report of the Committee consisting of the Rev. Canon Tristram,
Professor Newton, H. E. Dresser, J. S. Harting, and the Rev. A. F.
Barnes, appointed for the purpose of continuing the Investigation on
the Desirability of Establishing a " Close-time " for the Preservation
of Indigenous Animals. Rept. Brit. Assoc., 1872.

Do., do., do. Rept. Brit. Assoc., Bradford, 1877.

Statement by the Committee appointed by the British Association
for the Advancement of Science, for the purpose of continuing the
Investigation on the Desirability of Establishing a " Close-time "
for the Preservation of Indigenous Animals. Feb., 1876.

Report of the Committee . . . appointed for the purpose of
enquiring into the Possibility of Establishing a " Close-tune " for
the Protection of Indigenous Animals. 1876.

Report of the Committee, consisting of the Rev. H. F. Barnes-
Lawrence, C. Spence Bate, Esq., H. E. Dresser, Esq. (Sec.), Dr. A.
Gunther, J. E. Harting, Esq., Dr. Gwyn Jeffreys, Professor Newton,
and the Rev. Canon Tristram, appointed for the purpose of Inquiring
into the Possibility of Establishing a " Close-time " for Indigenous
Animals. Rept. Brit. Assoc., 1878.

Report of the Committee, consisting of Mr. Thiselton Dyer
(Sec.), Professor Newton, Professor Flower, Mr. Carruthers, and
Mr. Sclater, appointed for the purpose of ''Reporting on the present
state of our knowledge of the Zoology and Botany of the West
Indian Islands," and taking steps to Investigate Ascertained De-
ficiencies in the Fauna and Flora. Brit. Assoc., Bath, 1888. 1888.

Bird Migration in Great Britain and Ireland. Report of the
Committee . . . appointed for the purpose of making a Digest of
the Observations on the Migrations of Birds at Lighthouses and
Light-vessels, 1880-1887. Brit. Assoc., 1896.

Do., do., do. Third Interim Report. Brit. Assoc., 1900.

Do., do., do. Fourth Interim Report. (Proof.) Brit. Assoc.,
1901.

Do., do., do. Fifth Interim Report. Brit. Assoc., 1902.

Do., do., do. Sixth and Final Report. Brit. Assoc., 1903.

[Letters and reviews published in weekly and other Journals
have been omitted from the above list. For the sake of completeness
should be added three works, the publication of which extended over
a term of years, namely. " YarrelPs History of British Birds," vols. i.
and ii. ; "The Dictionary of Birds," and " Ootheca Wolleyana."]

INDEX

•

AD AMI, Prof., 102

Advent Bay, 84, 87

Agassiz, Prof. Louis, 110

Albemarle, William Charles, 4th Earl

of, 1

Alca impennis, 40 note, 41 note, 45
Aldeburgh, 156
Aldrovandi, U., 174 ; " Ornithologia,"

222

Alert, H.M.S., 21
Alkenhorn, 82, 91
Allen, Grant, " Selborne," edited by,

188-190

Alston, E., 19, 127
" Annals of Scottish Natural History,"

146 note

Anser brachyrhynchus, 85, 86
Anthus cervinus, 18
Aphanapteryx, 53
Apteryx, 308

Arcedeckne, Andrew, 271
Archangel, 47

Arctic Expedition, German, 21
— Regions, 47

Argyll, Duke of, 143, 166, 175 note
Aristotle, 173, 174, 230
Aster, the, 280, 285, 287
Athenceum, 124
Atkinson, T. D., 99, 101
Audubon, J. J., " American Ornith-
ology," 7
Auk, Great, or Gare-fowl, 27, 29, 30,

36-39, 40-52, 282, 286, 304, 306;

Little, 82, 86
Austen, Roberts, 129
Avocet, 222, 223

BABINGTON, Prof., 118, 237

Baer, Von, 212

Bahr, Dr. P. H., 210, 257 note, 314

Bainbridge, Mr., 5

Baird, Prof., Ill, 115, 118

Baldamus, E., 74

Balfour, Prof. Francis Maitland, 268;
work on Comparative Embryology,
103 ; death, 248, 251 note ; class
in morphology, 252

Balmat, Gideon, 17

Barrett-Hamilton, Major G. E. H.,
letters from A. Newton, 51, 204,
216, 217, 219, 240, 249, 260, 261,
288, 290, 313

Barrington, Mr., 172, 192

Bateson, William, 104, 126, 250

Bear Island, 81, 91

Bear-pie, 5

Becker, Lydia, 128

Bee-eater, the Indian, 7

Bell, Prof. Thomas, " Selborne," edited
by, 186, 187

Bell Sound, 81, 88

Benson, A. C., 245, 258, 262, 267

Berger, Andreas, 79

Berlin Museum, 74

Bewick, Thomas, " Land Birds " and
" Water Birds," 199

Biarritz, 305

Bidwell, Edward, 44

Birds : dialects in songs, 299 ; egg-
collecting, 146-150, 158 ; geogra-
phical distribution, 175, 185 ; migra-
tion of, 160-175 ; nomenclature,
215-217; protection of, 136-158;
close-time, 139-141 ; Society, 151

Birds of Aristophanes, 258-261

Birkbeck, Sir Edward, 77

Blackdyke Fen, 56

Black-game, 57, 301, 302, 313

Blackmore Museum, 311

Blackwell, E. J., 17

Blasius, 74

Bloxworth, 275

Bond, F., 47, 48

Bonney, Prof. T. G., account of the
Red Lions Club, 129

Bonxie or Skua Gull, 145, 155

Borrer, " Birds of Sussex," 289

Bos primigenius, 254

Boswell, James, " Life of Johnson,"
233

Bothnia, Gulf of, 19

Boyle, Willy, 259

Bradshaw, Henry, 268 note, 292

Brambling, 8

325

T.26

INDEX

Bramwell, Sir R, 129

Brandon, 297, 312

Braybrooke, Latimer, 9th Lord, 75

note, 94, 262
Breck, the, 4
Bremerhaven, 279
Bright, Mynors, 94
British Association, 52, 61, 118, 122,

127, 128, 136, 139, 156, 169, 185
British Museum, Catalogues, 235
British Ornithologists' Union, 43, 61,

69

Brodie, J., 119
Browne, T., 229
Browning, O., 107
Buckland, Frank, 127, 202
Buffon, G. L., 192, 229
Bunting, Snow, 35, 39
Burgess, Captain, 44
Burwell Fen, 54, 254
Bury Museum, 255
Bustard, 4, 7, 31, 54-58, 137, 150,

211, 305
Butler, Samuel, "The Way of All

Flesh," 98
Buzzard, Rough-legged, 4, 13, 165

CABANIS, 74

Calvert, Mr., 43, 44, 45, 46

Cambridge, 7, 93, 96-99 ; Museum,
46, 53, 108, 209, 254, 311 ; popula-
tion, 96 ; Railway Station, 93, 94 ;
University, 96 ; Magdalene College,
10, 11, 93, 99-101 ; chapel, 99, 100,
245-247 ; Professorship of Zoology
and Comparative Anatomy, founded,
133

Cambridge, Duke of, 253

Candler, Mr., 264

Capercaillie, 7, 224-228, 301

Carpenter, Dr., 127

Carrion-hawk, 295

Cavenham, 5

Chafin, Mr., " Cranbourn Chase," 211

Champley, Mr., 48

Chandler, Dr., 187

Chough, 275-277

Clark, J. W., 254, 255, 296, 304

Cleaver, Charles Pierrepont, 11

Coal Bay, 82, 85, 91

" Cob and Pen," 310

Coleridge, Samuel Taylor, 190

Collingwood, Dr., 119

Colymbus Adamsi, 285

Cordeaux, John, 138, 169

Cornhill Magazine, 247, 258

Cornwall, 278

Coues, Elliott, 166

County Councils, 151

" Cowshed," 263

" Crab," the dog, 9

Crane, 13, 150, 167 ; nest of, 19

Crotch, Duppa, 268

Crotch, G-. R., 268

Crows, 302

Cruises, 278-287

Cuckow, 66, 164, 167, 174, 223, 243

Curlew, Long-billed, 223

Cuvier, L. C., 257

DARWIN, CHARLES, 122, 175 ; " Origin
of Species," 102, 118; on natural
selection, 112, 115, 117; "Animals
and Plants under Domestication,"
114, 124; letters from, 124, 294,
295

Darwin, Sir Francis, 268, 273

" Darwinism, Early Days of," extract
from, 114 note

Decoy, origin of, 231

D'Hanionville, Baron, 47, 48

Dhuleep Singh, Prince, 56, 76, 102

Dickinson, Lowes, portrait of A. New-
ton, 289

"Dictionary of Birds," 53, 59, 108,
165, 167 note, 220, 238, 239, 272

" Dictionary of National Biography,"
195

Discovery, H.M.S., 22

Diver, Red-throated, 87, 89

Dodo, 52, 53

Dogs, 9

Draine, 229

Draper, Prof., 119

Drosier, R., " Account of an Ornith-
ological Visit to Shetland and Ork-
ney," 145

Drummond, Lieut. -Col. H. M., President
of the Ornithologists' Union, 61

Drury, Rev. Drue, 12

Drury Travelling Fellowship, 12, 73,
95 ; expires, 75

Du Chaillu, Paul B., 123

Duck, decoy, 231 ; Eider, 82, 84 ;
Longtailed, 80; Scaup, 209, 314;
Tufted, 154, 210, 314; White-
eyed, 315

Ducks, 34

Dufferin, Lord, 34

EAGLE-CLARKE, W., 215 ; letters from

A. Newton, 155, 161, 165, 167, 291 ;

observations on migration of birds,

170-173
Eagle, Golden, 7, 148, 154, 158 ; Sea,

18

Eagles, 282
Earth, rotundity of, 296

INDEX

327

Edmunston family, 144

Edwards, Thomas, 202

Egg-blowing, 24 ; collecting, 146-150,

158

Eggs, identification, 207 ; sales of, 17
Elveden, 1, 2, 3, 12, 56, 57 ; sale of, 76
Enare, Lake, 18
English essay prize, 11
Evans, A. H., 268
Evans, Henry, 50, 280
Evans, Sir John, 129, 311
Evans, William, 215 note, 217 note
" Extermination," article on, 59

FABER, 37, 39

Fair Island, 27

Falco peregrinus, 1

Falcons, 33, 283

" Family Club, the," 232

Farish, Prof., 99

Faroe Islands, 27

Fawcett, Prof., 122

Feilden, Col. H. W., 157 ; letters from

A. Newton, 21, 47, 50, 127. 179, 205,

211, 252, 287
Feltwell Fen, 4
Finland, 20
Finsch, 217

Fishes, migration of, 313
Fitzroy, Admiral, 119
FitzwUliam Museum, 96
Flamingo, 304, 305
Flannan Islands, 283
Flint Jack, 311
Flint-knapping, 312
Flutter-bugs, 305
Foula, 27
Foxes, Blue, 110
Francis, H. T., 233
Francis, Dr. W., 62
Fraser's Magazine, 19 note
Fringilla montifringilla, 8 note
Frost, John, 98
Froude, J. A., 256
Fulmar, 27, 29, 82
Funk Island, 52
Furse, Charles, portrait of A. Newton,

289

GADOW, H., 209

Gamekeepers, 314

Game Laws, 60

Gannets, 27, 383

Gare-fowl or Great Auk, 27, 40 ;

Skerry, 52
" Gare-fowl and its Historians," 41

note

Garland, the, 278
Gatke, Heir, 168, 278

Geikie, Sir Archibald, 280

Geneva, 2

Geographical Distribution of Birds,

175-185

Geological Record, 179
Germany, 74
Gesner, C., 174, 222
Gillaroo Trout, 117
Gillies' Land, 90
Glacier, Alfred Newton, 22
Glowworm, s.s., 304, 306
Gmelin, J. G., 167
Godman, Fred, 42, 62
Godman, Percy, 42, 62
Goldsmith, O., " Animated Nature,"

192

Goose, 39, 80, 85
Gorilla, 123

Gossamer, meaning of the word, 190
Goltland, 14
Gould, John, 12, 42, 115, 133 ; " Birds

of Europe," 201
Grakle, 69 note
Grant, Sir A., 57
Grant, John Peter, 154
Greenwell, Canon, 297
Grenville, Very Rev. the Hon. G.

Neville, 94
Grime's Graves, 297
Grinnell Land, 22
Grouse, 110, 176, 177
" Gryse," 227, 228
Guillemard, Dr. F. H. H., account of

his friendship with A. Newton,

265-274; "Ferdinand Magellan,"

308, 309
Gull, Black- backed, 34, 39; Glaucous,

32, 33, 34, 82 ; Iceland, 36 ; Ivory,

82, 84, 87, 89, 91 ; White-winged, 39
Gunther, Dr. Albert, 125
Gurney, John Henry, 12, 26, 62, 64,

158
Gyrfalcon, 14

HAMMERFEST, 17, 18, 19, 80, 92

Hanbury, George, 5

Haparanda, 19

Hare's whistle, 313

Harriers, 4

Hart, Chichester, 22

Hartert, E., 217

Harting, J. E., 47, 55 ; letters from A.
Newton, 48, 310; "White's Sel-
borne," 57 ; member of the Com-
mittee for the Protection of Birds,
140

Harvie-Brown, J. A., 19, 169, 204, 224,
235 ; letters from A. Newton, 20,
21, 51, 156, 157, 164, 165, 178, 203,

328

INDEX

211, 218, 219, 225, 229, 232, 240,

243, 249, 282, 299, 301, 311, 312;

" Fauna of the Moray Basin,"

202 ; " The Capercaillie in Scotland,"

226; "Fauna of Scotland," 236;

yacht, 285; "Song of the Shear-

water," 285
Hawker, Colonel, 4
Hawks Club, 7 note
Hebrides, 286
Heligoland, 278
Henslow, Prof., 11, 119
Herbert, Auberon, 141
Hesperornis, 179
Hewitson, W. C., 65, 244
Hibernation of birds, 166
Hickling, 150, 152
Hilton, Arthur, Light Green, 272
Hjaldalin, Herr, 31
Hobby, 307
Hceno, 18

Holarctic Region, 181, 182
Holt, Alice, 58
Holt-White, Rashleigh, letters from

A. Newton, 188, 198, 240, 241 ;

" Life and Letters of Gilbert White,"

191, 194, 196

Hooker, Sir Joseph, 30, 112
Hooper, 6, 18, 223
Homer, Rev. Joseph, 10
Horrebow, 233
Houghton, Richard Monckton, 1st

Baron, 1
Hudleston, W. H., 14 ; nickname,

211. See Simpson
Humming-birds, 23
Humphrey, Prof., 134
Hunter, John, 46, 212, 257
Huxley, Prof. T. H., 46, 119, 122, 123,

128, 132, 184, 204, 215, 244

Ibis or Avis, 62, 63-69, 120, 205, 207 ;

motto, 65
Ice Sound, 90

Iceland, 27-39, 110 ; Falcon, 30
" Iceland, No Snakes in," atory, 233
Ichthyornis, 179
Irby, Colonel, 305, 306, 307

JACK-SNIPE, 13
Jamaica, 54
James I., King, 2
Jardine, Sir William, 12
Jay, Siberian, 13, 14, 17
Jefferies, Richard, 203
Jenyns, Mr., 7
Jesse, Edward, 264
Jorgensen, 30
Jourdain, F. C. R., 159

KALBI, 166

Keblavik, 35

Keppel, Viscount, 2

Kingsley, Rev. Charles, 123 ; letters

from, 134, 255, 256, 296; "Water

Babies," 256
Kinnear, N. B., 209, 251
Kiowroo, story of, 293
Kirkuvogr, 30, 32
Kittiwake, 7, 137-139
Kiwi, 308

Knoblock, Ludwig, 71, 78, 85, 92, 293
Knot, 21, 38
Knubley, F., 242, 268

Lagopus rupestris, 176, 177

Lamarck, J. B., 110

Lapland, 15, 17-19

Larks or Chats, 111, 118; Crested, 116

Lausanne Museum, 45

Lava streams, 34

Lawson, Capt. J. A., 128 ; " Wanderings

in New Guinea," 128 note
Leadbeater, Mr., 43, 47
Lepierre, Dr., 45
Les Delices, 2
Life, Origin of, 179
Lilford, Lord, 46 272; letters from

A. Newton, 56, 187, 204, 235, 252,

259, 289, 301, 303, 307; letters to

him, 304-307
Lindsay, " History," 226
Linnean Society, 44, 112
Linnaeus, C., " Systema Naturae," 215
Linota montium, 7
Lions, Red, Club, 129 ; telegrams, 130-

133

Lister, J. J., 292
Lister, Lord, 257
Loch Roagh, 283
Lochiel, 154
Lofoten Islands, 18, 78
Lophopsittacus, 53
Lorange, Dr., 82, 84
Lowell, J. R., 193
Lubbock, Sir John, 119, 128
Lubbock, John, 119
Lumby, Rev. Canon J. Rawson, 230
Lundy Island, 278
Lydekker, Richard, 268, 273
Lyell, Sir Charles, 110, 112
Lyngen Fjord, 19

Macmillari's Magazine, 115 note, 117,

191 note
Magdalene College, Cambridge, 11. See

Cambridge

Magnussen, Eric, 31, 33, 37
Magpie, 207

INDEX

329

Malmgren, 79, 80, 85

Manatee, 254

Manning, Cardinal, 128

Manx Cats, 212

March, Lord, 5

Marsham, Robert, 18fi

Mascarene Islands, 52

Mauritius, 52

Maxwell, Sir Herbert, 146, 152, 153

Me Arthur, Mr., 224

McLauchlan, Dr., 224

Meade- Waldo, E. G. B., 53

Meal Sack, 29, 36, 37

Mendelism, 104, 125

Merganser, Hooded, 26

Meyer, Dr., 69

Migration of birds, 160-175

Milnes, Elizabeth, marriage, 1. See

Newton
Milnes, Richard Monckton, 1. See

Houghton

Milnes, Richard Slater, 1
Mistletoe, derivation of, 230
Mistletoe-Thrush, 229, 307
Mittel Hook, 87
Mivart, Prof., 128
Moore, Mr., 45
Morphology, 102, 252
Morris, F. O., "On the Permanence of

Species," 118
Muggeridge, Ernest, 268
Mulso, John, 188, 197
Muonio River, 19
Muonioniska, 13, 14, 293
Muoniovara, 92
Murray, John, 196
Musk Ox, 21

NAPOLEON I., Emperor, 102

Napoleon III., Emperor, 128

Nares Expedition, 21

Natural History journals, 242 ; re-
views on, 243

Nature, 156, 161, 163

Nearctio Region, 181, 182

Neville, Rev. the Hon. Latimer, 75,
94, 262. See Braybrooke

Neville-Grenville, George, 12

Newcomes, Mr. and Mrs., 5

Newman, Mr., 243

Newton, Alfred, birth at Geneva, 2 ;
accident, 4, 86, 169, 270, 279, 290;
pet-name, 6 ; drawing, 8 ; dogs,
9 ; at Magdalene College, Cambridge,
11, 76, 93, 95, 99 ; elected to the
Drury Travelling Fellowship, 12,
73, 95 ; journey to Lapland, 17 ;
at St. Croix, 23 ; in America, 24 ;
" Suggestions for Forming Collec-

tions of Birds' Eggs," 24 ; journey
to Iceland, 27-32, 110; lessons in
Icelandic, 32 ; at Kirkjuvogr, 32-
39 ; purchases a Great Auk's egg,
42 ; collection of eggs, 46 ; cruises,
50, 278-287 ; researches on the
Dodo, 52-54 ; the Great Bustard,
54-59 ; on the extinction of animals,
59 ; Secretary of the Ornithologists'
Union, 61 ; criticisms on the Ibis,
64 ; editor of it, 66 ; work on the
" Ootheca Wolleyana," 71, 209, 290 ;
at Copenhagen, 73 ; Germany, 74 ;
decides against taking holy orders,
75, 102 ; elected Professor of Zoo-
logy, 75 note, 133, 250 ; death of
his father, 76 ; at Spitzbergen, 77-
92; lectures, 104, 250, 265; "Zoo-
logy," 105 ; Sunday evenings,
105-107, 261, 265; political views,
107, 244, 271 ; chairman of the
Board of Biology and Geology, 107 ;
"Dictionary of Birds," 108, 220,
239, 272 ; characteristics, 109, 248,
259, 264; on Darwin's views, 112-

124 ; on the principles of Mendelism,

125 ; member of the Committee of
the British Association, 126 ; " The
Zoological Aspect of Game Laws,"
136 ; on the protection of birds,
140-159 ; egg-collecting, 146-150,
152, 158 ; migration of birds, 160-
175 ; geographical distribution, 175-
185 ; address at the British Associa-
tion, 183-185 ; accuracy, 207, 238 ;
edits the " History of British Birds,"
213; memory, 231, 232; library,
232 ; correspondence, 234 ; humour,
237, 264 ; method of writing,
238-241, simplicity of style, 241 ;
opposition to changes in the College
Chapel, 245-247 ; appearance, 258,
288 ; rooms in College, 261-265 ;
pipes, 269; death, 273, 292; at
Bloxworth, 275 ; death of his brother,
Edward, 287 ; portraits, 289 ; hon-
ours, 289 ; medals, 290 ; illness, 291

Newton, C. M., 254

Newton, Sir Edward, 2, 5, 62, 161, 234 ;
pet- name, 6 ; letters from Alfred,
9, 23, 61, 77, 80, 120, 202, 218, 280,
297 ; Assistant Colonial Secretary of
Mauritius, 52, 287 ; Lieut. -Governor
of Jamaica, 54, 288 ; death, 287

Newton, Elizabeth, 1

Newton, Francis Rodes, 23 ; at Copen-
hagen, 73

Newton, Major-General Horace Parker,

330

INDEX

Newton, Robert Milnes, 1

Newton, Samuel, 1

Newton, William, 1

Newton, William Samuel, 1

Nordenskjold, 85

" Norfolk Travelling Fellowship," 12,

95
North Cape, 18

OAHU Island, 310

Oban, 284

Oeland, 14

Qkapi, 232

Olaus Magnus, 167, 174

Old Lodge, 105

"Ootheca WoUeyana," 17, 18 note,

45, 49, 71, 209, 290
Orkneys, 282, 286
Ornithologists' Union, 61
Ornithology, 7, 65, 205, 220, 221,

253, 254
Oronsay, 282
Osprey, 155, 158

Otis arabs, 57 ; tarda, 7, 306 ; ietrax, 7
Ovibos, 21

Owen, R,, 46, 122, 123, 124, 133
Owls, 59, 301, 304
Ox, Extinct, 254, 255
Oyster-catcher, 164

PAGET, STEPHEN, 102

Pakearctic Region, 71, 181, 182

Palmen, Prof., 167

Papa Westray, 50, 51, 52, 286

Parnell, E. K., "Magdalene College,"

12 note

Pattrick, R, 251
Payne-Gallway, Sir R., 231
Pennant, Thomas, 225
Pentire, 275
Pepysian Library, 95
Perkins, J., 253
Perowne, Teddy, 245
Petchora, 14, 20
Pets, 9

Phalarope, 18, 36, 38, 39, 82, 89, 180
Philosophical Society, 7
Phoca barbata, 87, 88 ; grcenlandica, 89
Pine Grosbeak, 14, 17
Pintail, 231

Pipit, Red-throated, 18
Pliny, 173, 174, 232
Pochard, 315
Positivism, 244
Potter, Mr., 237
Prinds Gustav, the, 92
Prior, Edward, 268
Ptarmigan, 176-178
Punnett, R. C., 126

QUACKENBOSH, Dr., 128
Quagga, 127
Quatrepages, Jean, 124
Qvalo, 177

RAVEN, V., 94

Ravens, 4, 35

Ray Club, 311

Ray, John, 200

Razor-bill, 49, 52

Red Lions Club, 129

Redpolls, 7, 168

Redwing, 35

Reindeer, 80, 84

Reykjanes, 31, 32, 38, 40

Rhinoceros, White, 254

Rhynchcea, 294

Rolleston, Prof. G., 248 note

Rona, 283

Rooks, 303 ; shooting, 303

Round Island, 90

Rowley, G. D., 66

Royal Society, 67, 68

Ruff, 150

Russell, G. L., 47

Russell, Jack, 306

Ryk Island, 90

SAFE HAVEN, 90

St. Croix, Birds of, 23, 63

St. Kilda, 281

Salmon, Mr., 42

Salvin, Osbert, 42, 62, 64, 201 ; editor
of the Ibis, 66

Sandpiper, Broad-billed, 13 ; Curlew,
20 ; Purple, 35, 36, 38

Sandwich Islands, 310 ; Committee, 54

Saroe, 73

Sassen Bay, 87

Saunders, Howard, 145 ; " History
of British Birds," edited by, 214

Scales, Mr., 48

Sclater, Dr. P. L., 46, 52, 62, 65, 69, 70,
74, 123, 133, 215; editor of the
Ornithologist Journal, 61 ; secre-
tary to the Zoological Society, 63 ;
mistaken for Louis Napoleon, 128 ;
member of the Willughby Society,
201

Scoter, Velvet, 18, 27

Sea Birds' Protection Bill, 140

Sea-Fowl, 137-139

Seals, 80, 83, 86, 89, 284

Sedgwick, Adam, 103, 110, 268, 273

Seebohm, Henry, 204-206, 306

Selborne, 199

Semmoline, the 78, 81, 87, 88, 90

Sharp, Dr., 268

INDEX

331

Sharpe, Dr. Richard Bowdler, " Sel-

borne " edited by, 190
" Shearwater, Song of the," 285
Shiantdle, the, 285
Shiants, 287
Shilley Sound, 284
Shipley, Dr. A. E., 75, 250
Shooting, 3
Shore Loch, 14
Shrike, the Red-backed, 10
Simpson, A. C., 119
Simpson, W. Hudleston, 17, 18, 46.

See Hudleston
Skeat, Prof. W. W., 190, 311 ; letters

from, 220-222, 223, 230
Skeat, W. W., 249
Skibotn, 19

Skua, 14, 18, 27, 30, 39, 143-145, 155
Smew, 208
Smith, Rev. A. C., 22, 64, 65, 199, 214,

244, 279, 302
Smith, Sir Andrew, 201
Smith, Robertson, 272
Snoehaetten, 42
Snow Bunting, 20
Snowy Owl, 14
Solitaire, 52
Southwell, Thomas, letters from A.

Newton, 23, 40, 157, 196, 213, 229,

231, 238, 241, 243
Spitzbergen, 16, 64, 77
Spoonbill, 150, 156
Stamford, Earl of, 197
Stawell, Lord, 58
Stedman, " Surinamy," 221
Steeple Ashton, 12
Stephens, Darrell, 275
Sterna Caspica, 305
Stetchworth, 6
Steven's Auctions, 16
Stint Temminck's, 13, 18
Stor Fjord, 81, 89
Stork, 167
Straedmaes, 89
Strickland, Miss, 75
Strickland, Mrs., letters from A. New-
ton, 75, 127, 215, 237, 244, 251, 255
Strix uralensis, 59
Stubbs, Rt. Rev., Bishop of Oxford,

66, 119, 120, 256 note
Subspecies, 218
Suleskerry, 283
Sultana, the yacht, 77, 90
Surgeon's Hall, 45, 48
Sutton, Manners, 79, 82
Swallow, 196
Swan, 309 ; Australian, 295 ; Bewick's

20, 21
Swan book, 310

TANA River, 18

Taylor, E. C., 62, 64

Tegetmeier, W. B., 169, 201, 290

Temple, Dr., 120

Terns, 86, 89, 156, 285

Thackeray, W. M., 271

Thirion, M., 53

Thorshaven, 28

Thousand Islands, 89, 90

Tit, Bearded, 296

Titmouse, Bearded, 150 ; Crested, 154

" Titmousen," 301

Trampe, Count, 30

Trinomials, 217, 271

Tristram, Canon Henry Baker, 46,
52, 62, 64, 119, 128, 165, 235, 278,
301 ; letters from A. Newton, 25,

42, 67, 75, 77, 133, 142, 236, 250,
258, 287, 309 ; member of the
B.O.U., 67 ; illness, 68, 235 ; papers
on the Ornithology of Northern
Africa, 68; the "Sacred Ibis," or
the "Great Gun of Durham," 69;
collection of birds and eggs, 69, 111 ;
nickname, 121 ; member of the Com-
mittee for the Protection of Birds,
140

Tromso, 92

Trondhjem, 17, 80

Tuck, Mr., letter from A. Newton, 156

Tunstall, " Ornithologia Britannica,"

201

Turner, 201
Turnstone, 35, 36, 38
Tyndall, Prof., 129

UNITED Service Institution Museum,

43, 44, 45
United States, 24
Upcher, H. M., 55
Uria biirnnichi, 91
Ushant, lighthouse at, 170
Ussher, R., 51

VADSO, 18

Valhalla, the, 53

Van Voorst, Mr., 213

Varanger, 14, 18

Vesalius, 212

Vidal, Captain, 44

Vines, Prof., 107

Vipers, swallowing young, 212

Vole, 219

Voltaire, 2 note

WADDINGTON, Mr. and Mrs. 5
Wagstaff, Dr., 79
Wagtail, White, 35, 39

332

INDEX

Walker, Mr., school, 6

Wallace, A. R., 112, 115, 181, 182, 184 ;

" The Geographical Distribution of

Animals," 175 ; letter from, 296
Walsingham, Lord, 76 ; letters from

A. Newton, 143-145, 150; on the

Bill for the protection of birds' eggs,

146, 153
Warter, E., 94
" Wasp," the dog, 9
Waterhouse, Alfred, 97, 98
Waxwing, 14, 17, 313
West Indies, 22
Westerland, 14 note
Whales, 82, 87, 90
Wheatly, Henry B., edition of Pepys,

188

Whimbrel, 69, 221
Whittaker, T., " Tunisia," 68 ; " Birds

of Nottinghamshire," 200
White, Benjamin, 186
White, Gilbert, 57, 168, 240 ; editions

of "Selborne," 186-191; style of

writing, 193 ; " Life and Letters,"

194-196 ; birth-place, 199
White, John, 187
White, Thomas, 186
Whooper, 223
" Who's Who," 280
Wild Birds, Bill for the Protection of

140-143, 149, 152
Willughby, Francis, 200, 221
Willoughby Society, 201
Wilmot, Mr., 47
Wolf, Joseph, 63, 263, 267
Wollaston, A. F. R., 236

Wollaston, T. Vernon, 50 ; " Variation
of Species," 117

Wolley, Rev. John, 13

Wolley, John, 12, 46, 47, 62, 63, 71,
72/76, 117, 200, 208; career, 13;
ornithological discoveries, 13-15;
bird-hunting in Lapland, 15 ; sales
of eggs, 17 ; at Vadso, 18 ; Muo-
niovara, 19 ; journey to Iceland,
27-32, 1 10 ; lessons in Icelandic,
32 ; at Kirkjuvogr, 32-39 ; " Re-
searches [on the Gare-fowl or Great
Auk," 40 ; death, 41, 70 ; zoological
collection, 70 ; " Egg-book," 70 ;
letter from, 293

Wolmer Forest, 58

Woodall, Mr., 278

Woodcock, 165, 180, 302

Woodpecker, Great Black, 211, 212

Wren, Golden-crested, 170

Wryneck, 10

YARRELL, WILLIAM, 12, 42, 47, 48,
199 ; " British Birds," 213

ZOEGA, GEIER, 31, 34

Zoological Record, 124, 125

Zoological Regions, 183

Zoological Society, 54, 63, 124, 125,

144, 154, 204
" Zoological Aspect of Game Laws,"

136

Zoologist, 64, 138

Zoology, Museum of, in Cambridge, 108
Zoology, teaching of, 251 ; text-book,

105

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