Uncle Dick was right. I was astonished as we emptied the next case, which was full of tiny specimens, hundreds upon hundreds of humming-birds, with crests and throats like beautiful precious stones, and all so small that it seemed wonderful how they could have been skinned and preserved.
The more I worked with Uncle Dick the more I wondered, and the stronger grew my desire to follow in his steps. So when we had all the birds out so that they could dry in the warm air of the room, there were the cases full of beetles of all kinds, with glistening horny wing-cases; butterflies so large and beautiful that I used to lean over them, feast my eyes on their colours, and then go into day-dreams, in which I pictured to myself the wonderful far-off lands that produced such creatures, and think and think how it would be possible to go out there all alone, as my uncle had gone, and spend years in collecting these various objects to bring home.
Then I used to wake up again and work hard with my uncle, writing out names in his lists, all as carefully as I could, but of course making plenty of mistakes in the Latin names, while Uncle Joe used to sit and smoke and look on, rarely speaking for fear of interrupting us, till Uncle Dick looked up and started a conversation by way of a rest.
Then all the different birds when thoroughly dry had to be repacked in the boxes, with plenty of camphor and other preservative spices and gums to keep the various insects away, and quite a couple of months had slipped away before we were nearly done.
I ought to have been back at school, but Uncle Dick would not hear of my going, and he seemed to have such influence over my aunt that his word was quite law.
“No, Sophy, I have not half done with him,” he said one evening. “I don’t want to flatter the boy, but he is very valuable to me. I could easily get a clerk or copyist to make out my lists and help me select and rearrange my specimens; but he would do it mechanically. Nat takes an interest in what he is doing, and is a naturalist at heart.”
“But he ought to be going on with his studies,” said Aunt Sophia. “It is quite time he was back at school.”
“He is learning a great deal more than he would at school,” said Uncle Dick; “and his handwriting is a good deal improved. It is more free and quicker.”
“But there are his other studies,” said Aunt Sophia, who was in a bad humour.
“Well, Sophy, he has picked up a great deal of Latin since he has been helping me; knows ten times as much as he did about America and the West Indian Islands, and has picked up a host of little natural history facts, for he is always asking questions.”