I intended to have contributed a series of papers to "N. & Q." on the
brute creation, on plants and flowers, &c.; and in a Note on the latter
subject I promised to follow it up. However, as circumstances have
changed my intentions, I think it may be well to mention that I have in
hand a work on Macrocosm, or World of Nature around us, which shall be
published in three separate parts or volumes. The first shall be devoted
to the Brute Creation; the second shall be an Herbal, with a Calendar of
dedicated Flowers prefixed; the third shall contain Chapters on the
Mineral Kingdom: in the last I shall treat of the symbolism of stones,
and the superstitions respecting them. I purpose in each case, as far as
possible, to go to the fountain-head, and shall give copious extracts
from such writers as St. Ildefonso of Toledo, St. Isidore of Seville,
Vincent of Beauvais, St. Basil, Origen, Epiphanius, and the Christian
Fathers.
As the work I have sketched out for myself will require time to mature,
I shall publish very shortly a small volume, containing a breviary of
the former, which will give some idea of the manner in which I shall
treat the proposed subject.
Many correspondents of "N. & Q." have evinced great interest in the line
I intend to enter upon. (See Vol. i., pp. 173. 457.; Vol. iv., p. 175.;
Vol. vi., pp. 101. 272. 462. 518.) Their Queries have produced no
satisfactory result. I myself made a Query in my "Chapter on Flowers,"
some months ago, respecting Catholic floral directories, and two works
in particular, about which I was most anxious, and which were quoted in
_The Catholic Florist_, London, 1851, and I have received no answer. Mr.
Oakley, indeed, wrote to me to say that he "only edited it, and wrote a
preface," and that he forwarded my Query "to the compiler:" the latter
personage, however, has not favoured me with a reply.
In spite of all these discouragements, I have taken the step of bringing
my contemplated work before the readers of "N. & Q.," and I shall
gratefully acknowledge any communications relative to legends,
folk-lore, superstitions, symbolism, &c. bearing on the subjects
proposed. As I intend inserting a bibliographical list of the chief
works which come under the scope of each volume, I might receive much
valuable assistance on this point, especially as regards Oriental and
other foreign books, which might escape my researches. As regards the
brute creation, I have gotten, with the kind assistance of the editor of
"N. & Q.," Hildrop's famous reply to Father Bougeant; and I have sent to
Germany for Dr. Kraus's recent work on the subject.