A Book of Natural History

Huxley, Darwin, Wallace, Burroughs and Maeterlinck, writing for young readers — thirty-odd essays by the great naturalists on everything from the man-like apes to what worms do.

About the Book

1902Published
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34Essays
116Pages on this site

A Book of Natural History belongs to the Young Folks' Library, a series edited by Thomas Bailey Aldrich that gathered the best writing of the age for young readers. This volume was assembled by David Starr Jordan, the ichthyologist and first president of Stanford.

The contributors are not popularizers but the naturalists themselves: T. H. Huxley on the wonder of life and the man-like apes, Charles Darwin on the condor and the scissor beak, Alfred Russel Wallace on the umbrella bird, John Burroughs on birds' nests, Maurice Maeterlinck on the bee, and Grant Allen on strange nurseries.

This digital edition is built from a dual-engine OCR of the 1902 third edition, reconciled page by page.

This site reproduces the complete text of the original 1902 edition, digitized page by page from the original printing. The book is in the public domain.

Rights & ReuseThe complete text of A Book of Natural History (1902) is in the public domain in the United States — like all works published before 1928 — and is free to read, download, quote, teach from, and reuse. This digital edition (its transcription, restored images, and site design) is © 2026 PhotoOpAI, and any editorial commentary we add is clearly marked as ours; the underlying public-domain text carries no such restriction.