The Project Gutenberg EBook of Science in Arcady, by Grant Allen

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Title: Science in Arcady

Author: Grant Allen

Release Date: July 18, 2005 [EBook #16325]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

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SCIENCE IN ARCADY

BY

GRANT ALLEN

LONDON:
LAWRENCE & BULLEN,
16, HENRIETTA STREET, COVENT GARDEN, W.C. 1892.

To GRANT RICHARDS,
_IN GRATEFUL ACKNOWLEDGMENT OF MANY KIND OFFICES._

Avuncular Greeting.

CONTENTS.

PAGE

MY ISLANDS 1

TROPICAL EDUCATION 21

ON THE WINGS OF THE WIND 40

A DESERT FRUIT 56

PRETTY POLL 71

HIGH LIFE 90

EIGHT-LEGGED FRIENDS 105

MUD 123

THE GREENWOOD TREE 140

FISH AS FATHERS 157

AN ENGLISH SHIRE 177

THE BRONZE AXE 212

THE ISLE OF RUIM 231

A HILL-TOP STRONGHOLD 250

A PERSISTENT NATIONALITY 266

CASTERS AND CHESTERS 274

PREFACE.

These essays deal for the most part with Science in Arcady. 'Tis my
native country: for I am not of those who 'praise the busy town.' On
the contrary, in the words of the great poet who has just departed to
join Milton and Shelley in a place of high collateral glory, I 'love to
rail against it still,' with a naturalist's bitterness. For the town is
always dead and lifeless. There are who admire it, they say--poor
purblind creatures--because, forsooth, 'there is so much life there.'
So much life, indeed! No grass in the streets; no flowers in the lanes;
no beetles or butterflies on the dull ston