Lancaster daily intelligencer. [volume] (Lancaster, Pa.) 1864-1928, 1885-07-21
A BORN NATURALIST.
THE FRIEND OF ALL THE ANIMAL
KINGDOM FROM ms YOUTH UP.
Inhcriting Taste For Outdoor Nature-Iiow
He Played with the Birds of the Air
and the Beasts OF the Ficid.-MIak-
Ing Friends OF the Toads.

both had strong scientific tendencies, his 9
Iather, Dean Buckland, being naturalistand :
geologist of high reputation, and author of
one of the Bridgewater Treatises, and his
mother ga woman of rare intellectual &C
whose scientific taste and
power of accurate drawing enabled her to
share in and help forward Dean Bucklands
geological pursuits" Young Frank showed
his bent very carly. When he was but two
years old his mother recorded in her diary
that "he would have gone through all the
natural history books in the Radcliffe library
without making one error in misscalling a
perrot, duck, a kingfsher, an owl or vul-
ture." At four years of age, In fact, he began
collecting specimens of natural history, and |
at seven he began a journal. About this time
a clergyman brought Some fossils to DIR.
Buckland, to find out what they were. The
dean called his little son and said
frankie what are these ?'' They are the
vertebrie OF an ichthyosaurus," lisped the
child, who could not yet speak plain. 1t
must be said that he was reared in a most |
congenial atmosphere, as the following OK
tract from his memory shows:
"In h is early home at Christ church, be- |
sides the stuffed creatures which shared the |
hall with the rocking-horse, there were cages
full of snakes, and OF green frogs, in the din
| ing-room, where the sideboard groaned under
| successive layers OF fossils, and the candles
| sIOtu On IcnlnyOStuIlS bulntH-
| pigs were often running over the table; and
| occasionally the pony, having trotted down
| the steps from the garden, would push open
| the dining-room door, and careen round the
| table, with three laughing children on his
back, and then, marching through the front
| door, and down the steps, would continue
| his course round Tom Quad.
ain the stable yard and large wood house
were the fox, rabbits, guinea-pigs and ferrets,
hawks and owls, the magpie and jackdaw,
besides dogs, cats, and poultry, and in the
garden was the tortoise Con whose back the
children would stand TO try its strength),
and toads immured i'm various pots, 10 test
the truth OF their supposed life in rock cells"
When twelve years old he was sent to
Winchester college, and there he pursued his
researches in natural history, and practiced
poachng with enthusiasm. One of his old
school-felows gives this account of his dongs
at that period:
ellis delight was to study the habits OF
; live animals, and to examine their structure
when dead. An owl, a buzzard, and rae
| coon were successive tenants of one of his
lockers. A whole regiment of tame jack
davis owned him as their patron, headed by
J an evil-looking magpie, with a name not
I mentionabie to ears polite, all of whom he
used to feed twice day with bread and milk
: from (sick His hedgehogs kept
C open perpetual fosse at the base of the wall
q bounding the college meads, and good deal
, of agility was generated one day by Frank 4
u appearance i'm the schoolroom at the crowded
e moment just before the entrance of the mas
q ter, brandishing bottle of amonia and
proclaiming that the viper had got loose. lie
I. was a dexterous taXidermist, and might bt
# seen on a half holiday in the deserted
(Moab) or lavatory, plying his scalpel
l. and surrounded by smell of corrosive
p sublimate, the subjects being cats, bats
a which nested i'm a hollow plane tree III til,
meads; and moles, OF whose skins he con
structed n very comfortable waistcoat TIT
le flayed bodies of the smaller creatures wer
:, sometimes eaten; squirrel pie and mic
IL cooked in batter, ranking special dainties
e- Cftener tied up in gallipots, and buried in tn
4 mud Of a yilanous puddle, called Log Pond
. till the flesh fell from the bones and IL bc
III came easy to articulate the skeleton. Towar,
)t the end OF his school days his anatomica
IN studies enlarged their scope; gruesome frag
io ments Of humanity were conveyed secret
10 from the hospital, and as secretly dissected
n He came to look on his schooliellows with
IA professional eye. One r., boy with
:" dolicocephalous head, used to relate with
le slight shiyer that he had overheard Bucklan
muttering to himself, "What wouldn't
give for that fellows SKULL %
ma INTRoDUCING NEW sUBJECT.
er From Winchester he went to Christ co
or lege, Oxford, and soon became noted ther
for his strange pursuits and his amiable d
position. debating society was started b
,al Lord Duiierin. Of course the young me
,er discussed as a rule only the loftiest topic
nj But Frank Buckland astOnished and di
nd mayed them by reading as essay on the que
ne ton" Whether rocks are beneficial to th
IN. farmer or not" The narrator of this stor
cn adds: " think he must have had il all h
" own way. ! don't think that even Lor
nd Duflerin, with all his versatile genius, mad
he much of the rocks"
dis lie kept bear in his chambers, an eagle,
he number of snakes, and bewildering yariet
mo- 1 OF small creatures. The bear was name
s Tiglath-Peleser. They used to dress him i
- cap and gown. DIR. Merriman record
nc some amusing recollections OF his colleg
ial | life:
"Well do remember his coming in on
day, beamng with delight and sayinl
,ar 'Oh Merriman, have brought you SOM
70, thing you will like : and then, thrusting b
as hands into his breast pocket, he pulled fort
nd and placed on my table snake.
81 remember also on one occasion goin
down to Christ church to see him. AS
opened the door he exclaimed, 'Oh! Merr
man, stop a minute-my adder is out"
bi- need hardly say ! penetrated no furth,
until saw him stoop down, catch the thin
by the tail-its fangs had not been drawn.
mediately shut Just after this his faith,
lty came in. II was soon after he was mad
ly. dean of Westminster. He had come dow
int tolecture, and, opening the little black bs
80 which he bad in his hand he produced to
20 toiso for Frank. i have often wonderf
ed, whether 1t was the one which has now b
es. come famous all the world over as being d
is creed to be an insect in the judgment of II
sb railway officers.
In "He came down to me one day tor the pu
~ pose OF telling me what he had for dinner Il
me day before-namely panther chops He WI
fn- great friend OF the curator of the then e
a isting Surrey geological gardens. From hi
de Frank heard one day that the panther WI
am dead. wrote up at once he said, to te
10 him to send me down some chops. 1t ha
he however, been buried couple OF days, bl
lc, got them to dig it up and send me som,
dy IL 0dS not Uery good'"
'o WELL TRAINED CHAMELEON.
'se He had a chameleon who "used to star
upon an inverted wine-glass with his Ia
round the stem and assimilate flies. This /
did with concentrated gravity and ent
want of speculation in his Opaque and pr
on tuding eyes, which convulsed wine partie
I'M especially when he concluded his perfo
"a nance by tumbling head foremost into Il
ea ed preserved ginger" Presently he went
eu Giessen to study chemistry under Lebi
for he had resolved to he q surgeon Viii
rg there he continued collecting as usual, an
Die ON the return journey a funny incider
rs, occurred.
ne "He brought with him this time lar flu
III of the red slugs he wished to Introduce I'M
England they at least were noiseless an
would not croak like frogs. In the opposi
es corner ofthe diligence placidly slumbered
M lk traveller with ample bald head Frank ais