Page:The Zoologist, 4th series, vol 5 (1901).djvu/408

380 honour and esteem by every successive generation of British naturalists.

A very different man from the Northumbrian controversialist was the father of Gallic zoology. Pierre Belon was the favourite of prelates, welcomed by foreign ambassadors, and flattered by courtly parasites. But he was not spoilt by mature prosperity any more than by his early adversity. A lively, quick-witted Frenchman, with a passionate love of birds, he had obtained a good knowledge of the birds of his beloved France before he commenced those travels which have rendered his name so famous. Aldrovandi says that his French was very bad, but good Ulysses must have his little hit at all possible rivals. Probably he was right in this particular, for the prose of Belon's 'Oyseaux' is difficult reading; but it is one of the few books which we can always take up with fresh pleasure. Belon has the knack of making you feel that he is talking to you about the birds he has just seen; the Vultures that soar around the volcanic hills of Auvergne; the Wall-Creepers that zigzag about the precipices; the Ptarmigan that frequent the high Alps; and many other fowls of divers orders. His prose is full of chit-chat. At one moment he describes the anatomy of some uncommon bird; at the next he is telling you how to cook a Hoopoe, or something equally irrelevant to the theme upon which he was gravely discoursing an instant ago. He was interested by two species of birds which he found in England; for of course he visited England, like Clusius and other contemporary naturalists. The first species, which was new to Belon, was the Norfolk Plover; the other was the Cornish Chough. When he recrossed the Channel he searched for Norfolk Plover, and found that this species was common to France as well as Britain. The migration of birds constantly occupied his thoughts. He was much impressed by the sight of Quail migrating across the Mediterranean. His remarks upon the migratory habits of Pelicans are very interesting; but, indeed, he was a delightful raconteur, and could entertain you with some pleasant reminiscence of almost every European bird. His untimely death by the hand of an assassin in the Bois de Boulogne, at Paris, was one of the saddest events of the sixteenth century. Our French confrères have reason to be proud of Pierre Belon, of Le Mans.