The early nineteenth century witnessed an explosion of possibilities for amassing new kinds of experience: through books, magazines and newspapers, which reached out to ever wider audiences in this period; through travel, which became faster, more comfortable and more affordable; and through displays of the world's treasures and novelties at museums, exhibition halls, galleries, theatres, gardens and menageries. In the midst of all these possibilities, individuals expanded their range of experiences vicariously, collecting portraits and biographies of the eminent and privileged and devouring images and descriptive accounts of far-flung corners of the world. They also acquired new experiences in person, setting out to confront the strange, the new, the exotic, the famous and the eccentric face to face.

In September 1847, William Kinsey, Rector of Rotherfield Greys in Oxford-shire, set out to do just this. In a published account of his visit to Walton Hall, home of the naturalist Charles Waterton (1782–1865), he explained:

Kinsey had the pleasure of joining ‘an intellectual party’ in paying a visit to Waterton at his home and, he assured readers of the Gentleman's Magazine, ‘it was ever after a “red letter day” in my remembrance’. In fact, Kinsey was just one of many thousands of people to visit Walton Hall during Waterton's lifetime. Visitors from all walks of life recorded the intense anticipation of setting foot into the picturesque park, where birds and animals were protected against poachers and other predators; of viewing the ‘museum’ in the hallway, with its shimmering, lifelike specimens and satirical taxidermic monstrosities; and, most of all, of coming face to face with the ‘singular and eccentric naturalist’ himself.