Having been permitted to dedicate my work on the "Birds of Australia" to Her Most Gracious Majesty Queen Victoria, I was naturally desirous of dedicating the companion-work on the Mammals of the same country to Her Majesty's most enlightened and accomplished Consort; and the required permission was readily and graciously granted me. The dispensation which has deprived Her Majesty and the Prince's adopted country of one whose untimely loss we all deplore, still leaves me the privilege of that permission, and my work will continue to have the honour of being inscribed to His Royal Highness. It is with a melancholy satisfaction that I accordingly retain that Dedication, which, should it meet my Sovereign's eye, will, I think, only recall to her that love which the whole country entertains for his cherished memory. I feel that nothing I can say respecting the admirable qualities of this most enlightened Prince can in any way add to the deservedly high reputation of one whose great learning and manifold virtues, while he was among us, did so much for Science and Art, and whose example, we trust, will influence generations yet unborn.
