Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 11.djvu/489

Rh England. Naturally, in these somewhat hasty observations, his favorite departments received the larger proportion of his attention.

It was his fortune to first place his foot on the Old-World soil in the quiet and lovely, the very quaint and very old-fashioned, little city of Bremen, and there to make the acquaintance of two ornithologists whose reputation is world-wide, and who, among the followers of this science, stand in the front ranks—Dr. Georg Hartlaub and Dr. Otto Finsch.

Dr. Hartlaub is a physician, in full practice, standing at the head of his profession, but finding ample time, without neglecting his professional duties, to devote to the study of his favorite science, and to favor the world with valuable contributions, the results of his careful and exhaustive researches. A little past the prime of life, he is still in full and vigorous health. He has made the birds of Africa his principal study. As incidentally attesting Dr. Hartlaub's popularity and high standing among his brother ornithologists, it may be here mentioned that in Gray's "Hand-List of Birds" are no less than twenty-six different species, and one genus, upon which has been bestowed the name of Hartlaub—a compliment that has been paid to no other naturalist, living or dead, not even to the great Linnæus or to the illustrious Cuvier.

Dr. Finsch, though a much younger man, is fully the peer of his distinguished townsman in his reputation in ornithological science. He is the Director-in-Chief of the Natural History Museum of Bremen, which, though by no means among the largest, enjoys the reputation of being one of the most excellent in its arrangement, in Europe. In regard to this, unfortunately, I had not complete opportunity to judge. A new building was in the course of erection on the site of the old museum, and most of the collections, being packed away, were inaccessible. A portion of the birds were open to inspection, and well attested the taxidermic excellence of their preparation, which is said to characterize not only this department, but the whole museum. Dr. Finsch is author of an excellent and, to the student, invaluable monograph on the parrots; and, although he has largely contributed, with Dr. Hartlaub, to investigate the ornithology of Africa, probably there is no one living more generally familiar than he with the ornithological forms of the world. Since I met him he has been absent from home, in charge of an important exploring expedition to the arctic islands, north of Eastern Asia, from which he has recently returned.

Passing from Bremen to Düsseldorf, on the Rhine, our way took us through the old capital of Westphalia, that quaintest of quaint places, Münster; one, too, made so painfully memorable in history by the Vandal acts of the fanatical Anabaptists, and the even more terrible retribution that was visited upon their leaders. There we made a pause, in order to examine a very remarkable private collection of