Eliza Brightwen

Eliza Brightwen (1830-1906) was born Eliza Elder in Banff, Scotland, and after her mother died in 1837 she was raised near London by her uncle Alexander Elder, co-founder of the publishers Smith, Elder & Co., with no formal schooling beyond what his library gave her. From 1855 she lived with her husband, the banker George Brightwen, at The Grove in Stanmore, a 170 acre estate where she hand-reared and studied wild birds, mammals and insects; the title page of this book names her a Vice-President of the Selborne Society. Long spells of ill health kept her close to home, and she published nothing until she was sixty. Six nature books followed between 1890 and 1903, written in a plain first-person voice that set her apart from the scientific writing of her day.