.J^-v { ■ '^>,-J It '^1/^ ::^y w:-v:- ■■■■'. i»f'*-j'^'; ; . ; Ex Libris C. K. OGDEN TNTEE'S WORKS, ee Volumes, complete, IBs. Second Edition, I ice (>s. Subfile Brains and Lissom Fingers; Being son riii . l-marks of oor Industrial and Scientific Progress, and otlier Papers. By.A. WY^TER, M.D., M.R.C.P., London. Gonteiniog 39 Articli-s. amongst which will "be fOund— Fraudulent Tra^e Marks. Village Hospitals. A Day with the Coroner. Air Traction. Undersea Railroad. Illuminations, Vivisectiott. • i Boat-BuUdiqgfejJJJg^hinery. ■«-S^' # '/.-Mi- ■RrtraT Commercial Grief. Aerated Bread. Needlemaking. Preserved Meats. tactaiiMitt: Physical AntipatWes. Ocean Horticulture. Brain Difficulties. Ilunian Hair, &c. Aho Crown i. The Electric Telegraph. Advcrlisements. Fiffs and Fire Insurance. The Zoological Gardens. The Police and the Thieves. I^ts, Mortality in Trades and Pro- Wooiwi ^ ' fessiaps. Lodging,. , .'. 1 Lunatic Asylums. Solditrs. London: Robert Hari'v i -- . ii)2, PicrAPiLLv. A/ (ill I fie Libi-aria,' -t i t-ioM 1 1. ~ i iiting tO the first Appearance Man upon Kail II. .ni iKt t,. •' , i .r^wth and Laws of Life. By •). I-. .Mil. ION, MK.rs. < ohtcltts, I. B«giniii -• I I ^1' 'I I '•■<-■ I ■• • 9. Knt liu.i -rH . .. I- ,,(', ;.., I.,., 3. Fi«t HiKi.i.r. I, .I.' .. ;■ '■ >■ : A. Writ W.iK.i ,. r, ,/ I . . '.i.. 1 4. FirrtC.-jiu.;, .j! >... I. ^ H. '■■'■• i. ;■ •■ >i ■> i ■■ (. First LaiiRUkge. I : , i<. I 7, First Alphabet. 8. The Battff of Life. st-_ ■III, Holiday Papers. V HARRY JON I - Incumbent i>f St. Lukr't. Betuii I- - lloli tn. Work. I,™. Km.- r. I. -.. iiul . I ! -«n. .1. .11 /./.., < /.-(/,, /(./,!/ ,lii,.^!, ,/. Dr. Lankester on the Uses of ^nima.]s in Bielation to tke Industry of Man. Part I . One shillingr, ronlaint: U .^ '1. Hons. Soajp. Waste. Past II., Eigtilcenpencc, contains: Sponge* and CoraU. sbetl-fith. Inwcts. Fur*. Feathera, Homa, and Hair. Animal I'rrf'imfi Dr. Lankester on Food. PAaT I., One ShiiruiL,', Wttrr. S.ilf 1 1 , . r I . , . , - <) lut. >'icih-torriier» An P*KT II., I AlcoU.i U'iflfH. ( ..i,.1,m; 1 . :l, I 1 ilpj. . ■ ilcl""». , I • Ur. Laakfttrr iUii ui ttic .ii-< iirMve le*«oni which If 'Jelivcf^ on the whole summer, carrying the vessel back, one Snaring Pike. 49 on each side, with several rests, and carefully emptying it into the mere. Thus we trans- planted many score of little perch, who had long been sick of one another's society, and turned off on their tails, each one for himself, directly they had an opportunity of being independent. We felt that perch alone would not be enough, so we set to work snaring pike. There was a fen in the parish traversed by a slow stream. From this a number of straight dikes, about five feet wide, stretched right and left. In the spring, the pike, which abounded in the river, used to penetrate up these to spawn. This was our opportunity. Armed with a pole tipped with a wire noose, we crept along by the side of the ditches, till we saw a pike basking in the shallow, over the warm black mud. Hist ! be quiet. Here is one. Lowering the pole gently about a yard before him, the wire having been previously tried to see whether it slipped easily, we passed the loop slowly over his nose. If we could do this without touching him, and coax it on past his gills, he was ours. A sharp jerk tightened the noose — a tug, a splash, and out floundered Mr. Pike sideways, very much astonished and woke up, but none the worse, except, perhaps, E 50 The Moat. for the displacement of a few scales where the wire closed and nipped him round. Thus we sometimes caught half-a-dozen on a holiday. We took them all scrupulously to the' mere, where they darted off after a moment's con- sideration, each one believing he had cleverly given us the slip after all, so difficult is it to judge of another's motive. We got on well with the pike and perch. The next thing was to get the former supplied with food. For this, we dragged the moat of a farm about two miles off. This belonged to my grandfather, and swarmed with carp. It had never been fished, and on a clear day, you might see numbers swimming about, probably in the belief that theirs was the only world in the universe. One of our neighbours had a drag-net ; this we borrowed ; and under the direction of a good-natured gamekeeper, prepared for the great event. First, as the wood-stack adjoined the moat, many logs and sticks had found their way into it, and had to be removed — otherwise, they would not only have torn the meshes, but lifted the net up, and let out the fish. So my brother and I spent a half-holiday in wading about with rakes, and stirring up, along with the sticks we hauled out, much accu- Preparation. 5 1 mulated nastiness ; besides this, we dug a trench at the end of the moat, and lowered the water about a foot by letting it off into a ditch. While we were clearing the moat, the farmer, a red-faced old gentleman, named Moses, who wore a thick black neckerchief, which, I believe, he put on over his head of a morning like a horsecollar, excited us with promise of the sport we should have ; he had counted the carp by hundreds — thousands, he might say — and the yardman, last Tuesday, when he went to fetch a pail of water to wash his cart, after coming back from market, saw one as big as a sow. At last the day came. We carried the net in a cart, and fitted up a tumbril with a large tub, to bring home the fish. The drag was about six feet deep and ten yards wide, with a rope at each corner, and a long pocket in the middle. It was not quite wide enough for the moat, so a man walked at each end with a big stick, thrashing the water and kicking about, to keep the fish in the middle. We paused occasionally to let the corks float up, and to remove several sticks which the leads at the lower edge of the net scraped up. Presently the prey began to show — some flopped over the net, and others escaped E 2 52 The Drag Net. at the edges, knocking against one's legs in their excusable hurry to be off. Still, many remained ; and when the net came opposite the sloping place where the horses used to drink, we ran it on shore, filled with a mass of animated mud. Flop, flap, splutter — some 200 carp, many of large size, were flurrying about, sli]3ping out of our fingers, and splashing the filth into our faces, till we were as muddy as they. Of course, we boys dashed into the thick of it at once. Some few got off, but we tossed most of the fish into the tub before they knew where they were. After this we groped about at the edges of the moat, specially among the roots of some trees, and found several great cunning fellows, who had shoved their noses into holes, and were waiting quietly till the fuss was over. These we tickled, slipping the hand coaxingly along their backs ; then a quick dig of the thumb into the gills, and a firm gripe, secured even the strongest ; but no one who has not tried it knows how strong and slippery a large carp, say of four or five pounds weight, is under the water. Even when fairly raised above the surface, he will surely fling himself out of your grasp, unless you get your thumb well into his.gills. We dragged the moat several times again Carp and Pike. 53 that day, and carried quite a colony back to the mere — once there, they served only to furnish food for the pike, for we could not catch them. The seniors were too big to be swallowed, and so the supply was kept up. Sometimes, however, even the larger ones were attempted by their voracious neighbours. Several years afterwards, I was fishing there from my punt, and saw an odd movement at the surface of the water about ten yards off. Paddling up, I found a biggish carp swimming about with a pike of less than his own size hanging upon his nose. The pike had been dead some time, for he had begun to decay, and leeches were clinging to his side. He had tried to swallow the carp, but could get only about half its head into his mouth. Having gaped to the full stretch of his jaws, he could not open his mouth wider to draw his teeth out, so he remained attached to his intended dinner, and died a victim to gluttony. The poor carp, not being able to get rid of his enemy, even when dead, had to go about his business with a corpse as big as himself on his head. Growing weak, he rose to the surface, where I found him, swimming feebly round and round, with this hideous incumbrance. I took him into the boat, slit the pike's jaws 54 Success. open with my knife, and released the carp, who paddled off with a light heart and a very sore nose. But I must not anticipate. We transferred a large tubful of fish from the moat to the mere, where they multiplied, and served the pike. To these and the perch we added store of tench, mostly taken with the hook in neigh- bouring ponds. For three or four years we made no attempt to catch any fish in the mere. The first trial was for pike, trolling. After a" few throws, my brother had a run, and presently landed a fine fellow of about five pounds weight. From this time he went on; but no success seemed to keep their numbers down, so prodigiously had the pike multiplied themselves. The place swarmed with them. The perch, too, gave excellent sport. On a cloudy summer day, with a soft wind, I have taken two or three dozen very respectable fish. They were no longer the sickly pale little fellows we used to catch in the ponds, but strong, dark, and fat, weighing, on an average, three-quarters of a pound. We seldom caught a small one. They were so well fed, that cook said when she fried them she never had occasion to yse any butter. Bow Nets. 55 The tench also grew fast. We sometimes caught them with a hook and Hne, but by far the greater number were taken in bow-nets. These are nets made in the shape of a large drum, the ends, instead of being flat, opening inwards, leaving at last only a narrow aperture; so that it is easy for a fish to swim into the interior of the drum, but next to impossible for him to find his way out. The inducement for the tench to enter is a nosegay of bright flowers. This excites their curiosity. Not content with looking at it from the outside, they are never satisfied till they can touch it with their noses. The nosegay is suspended in the middle of the drum, which is sunk in water about its own depth. The tench congregate outside, at first only asking one another what it can be. Presently, some adventurous spirit is overcome by curiosity, and finds his way in; the rest soon follow, and I have taken up a net of this kind, which had been laid down only for one night, with as many as a dozen of these fish within it — all large. Few fish but tench are thus inquisitive. Occasionally, a strong pike will charge the net, and go slap through, thus letting out others as well as himself; but the gentle, timid tench, if left to themselves, hardly ever escape. But 56 Trimmers. though the pike sometnnes broke through our bow-nets, they, in their turn, were deceived by the trimmers, A common black quart-bottle, with ten yards of line twisted round its neck, and then stuck in a notch in the cork, leaving an end of about a foot, is attached to a dead fish, with the shank of a double hook passed through him, the point sticking out on each side of his mouth. The motion of the water makes the bottle bob about, and the bait move as if it were alive. Mr. Pike swallows it, and swims off, little thinking of the fatal evidence to his whereabout that accompanies him in the shape of the bottle. You have only to take up the bottle, haul in the line, and the pike necessarily follows at the end of it. We caught numbers thus, when the water grew too weedy for us to troll. The carp we never saw again, except on two or three occasions in the summer, when they got into a shallow bay with a narrow neck, which ran out of the mere. Once we were sitting in the library, when the coachman came up to the window in great excitement to say that a whole shoal of large carp were playing about there. We happened to have the old drag-net in the coach-house ; so we ran it down in a wheelbarrow; laid it across the neck of the Carp ill Shoal Water. 57 bay, to prevent the return of the fish Into the mere; and running into the water, chased the carp about till we caught them with our bare hands. There were about a dozen, all large ; one weighed more than nine pounds. I remember throwing myself down upon him, and getting him between my knees ; then I seized him, with my thumb in his gills, and bore him out above my head with great splash- ing and triumph. They very seldom, however, gave us a chance like this, and it was impossible to take them with a hook — they were too shy. We tried over and over aorain with the most delicate worms and prepared paste, but it was of no use. There was a deep hole in the middle of the mere, and we had reason to believe that the large carp generally lay there, for, except on the occasion when they made the fatal trip to the shallow bay, we never caught even a sight of them in the water. But they served the purpose for which we introduced them into the mere, inasmuch as they kept up a continual supply of little ones for the pike. I have gone into these details, as perhaps a young reader may be tempted to stock some barren pond in his neighbourhood. Our patience was rewarded ; we learned not to 58 Carp in Shoal Water. despise the day of small things. In a few years after we had put in the first fish, B n Mere got the credit of being one of the best angling-places for miles around. (59) DABCHICKS. |ROPERLY, I ought not to call them dabchicks — not at least in capitals, and at the head of my paper — for the true distinctive English name of the bird is "The Little Grebe." But "dabchick" is so happily expressive of the habits and appear- ance of the animal, that it recalls in a moment its nervous jerky motion on the water, and its sudden disappearance with a " flip," as if, instead of diving, it had unex- pectedly jumped down its own throat. Oh! those long spring summer days, when I lay in my punt among the rushes of the mere, and watched the manifold incessant business of its watery world. The mere, so called, of my youth, and which my brother and I stocked when we were little boys, was a pond of about ten acres, swarming with life above and below its surface. It lay about 200 yards from our house, and, with gently sloping green banks, was skirted on the further side by an irregular belt of trees, among some of whose trunks the 6o The Punt. water rose when the mere was full. My brother and I had built (with considerable assistance, It must be confessed, from the village carpenter) a punt, after the recipe given in Colonel Hawker s book on shooting. We built it in the coach-house, and when it had been carried down to the brink, in, or rather on, a tumbril, we watched its launch, and gloried in its capabilities with an interest worthy of the " Warrior." A great portion of my subsequent holiday life I spent in that punt, and baled out of it, in turn, I was going to say, half the water in the pond. Like most things which are in the main a success, it had its weak points, and one was an occasional trick of leakinof. More- over, it was a bad sailer; being quite flat- bottomed, however close-hauled and with the helm jammed hard down, it invariably moved before the wind, like a leaf. We boys con- cealed this unredeemed lateral motion from ourselves for a while, by saying that she " paid off" rather. But it would not do; after trying scores of times to sail across the mere with a half-wind, and always drifting sideways to the lee shore, we laid up the mast in ordinary, and stuck to orthodox punt propulsion. The place simmered with life. It was famous, among other products, for leeches. People used to Catchiii the process of setting out their breakfast, from the nearest boughs, hopping about within a few yards, in great anxiety, till the nuts were pinned down. They would leave any neigh- bouring tree directly they saw their friend come out of the house and approach the table with their morning meal. We always fed them at our own breakfast time. At last we tried whether they would take food from the hand, and threw them some. By this time they had grown so bold that after a few days' trial they would catch the nuts thrown towards them — not, as I have seen it mentioned in some book of natural history, with the claw, but with the beak. They always darted down and caught the nut from beneath. They were now so tame as generally to remain in the neighbour- hood of the mulberry tree, and fly towards us when we tapped on one of the branches — looking out sharp for a catch, which they very seldom missed. ( 82 ) LARKS. ARKS are perhaps the most famlHar of all small birds to us English. The robin commits himself more fear- lessly to the society of mankind, but then he is essentially a country bird. The swallow skims the parks of our great towns, as well as the meadows by the far-off stream where no wheel is heard, but she comes to us only in the summer. The sparrow, indeed, remains all the year, and may be found everywhere — as fearless as the robin — a bird of catholic impudence ; but even he does not pretend to sing, only to twitter. The lark, on the other hand, may be heard in the field and in the street, in the sky and in the cage. We find him on Salisbury Plain, and in Hungerford Market ; up at " heaven's gate," and down in the bird-shops about the Seven Dials. Moreover, he pos- sesses the (to him) questionable recommenda- tion of being eatable ; he is a delicacy to the tongue as well as to the ear ; he is pleasant ta Excellence of Larks. 8 o see, to hear, and to taste. Sparrows are seldom cooked, except, perhaps, at the urgent request of spoiled little boys who have caught them ; and roast swallows or robin-pie are delicacies yet to be proved. But the lark combines in himself almost all that a little bird can offer. He is very beautiful, though not brilliant ; sings the sweet songs of liberty even when a captive ; and after all, stripped of his bright brown feathers, and with his melo- dious throat twisted, gratifies his owner to the last mouthful, when eaten with gravy and fried bread-crumbs. Call not this horrible, dear reader, but recol- lect that I have here put down the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, about the advantages and excellence of larks. It is indeed this fulness of my record, this anxiety to say all that I can bring in rightly about them, which causes the painful transition from song to simmering, from the vault of heaven to the spit. Such contrasts may be horrible to some ; there is perhaps more of the horrible than you think in most quiet histories, if you did but— as in the case of the larks — know all. Don't suppose, from the readiness with which I passed on to the gastronomical properties of G 2 84 Bi7^d Similes. the bird, that I myself am fond of eating larks ; I am not. I like to hear them sing ; to see them mount. As for eating, most men hold that birds are tedious and provoking when small. They like bigger cuts, though they don't inherit that appetite of our ancestors, the record of which survives in the saying : " A goose is a foolish bird — too much for one, but not enough for two." Larks are not only, as I have said, good to see, hear, and taste, but they provide more similes and illustrations to humanity than any other birds. I have not forgotten the eagle, of course ; how some people are " eyed " like him ; how he sets forth the conquering far- seeing soul, when he is seen " sailing in supreme dominion through the azure fields of air." I have not forgotten that a man may be as hoarse as a rook, as greedy as a vulture, as pert as a sparrow. I have heard a little pretentious fellow compared to a tom-tit on a drum. No doubt there are some as wise as owls, and as silly as geese. There are others who swim like ducks, more who chatter like magpies. The local magnifico, when carried away by his pride, is compared to a turkey- cock ; lovers bill and coo like turtle-doves. The persistent sot boasts of being able to sit Those supplied by Larks. 85 like a hen; the high feeder lives like a fighting- cock. Birds and their belongings furnish abundant imagery. Nothing can be lighter than a feather, nothing can be softer than down. The locks of the hero are as black as a raven ; the neck of his lady-love is as graceful as the swan's. I believe that these illustrations might be carried out to much greater length by any one who would take the pains. The thoughtless little school-boy re- peats his lesson like a parrot. The confident assertor of his vulgar rights claims his privilege of speecii, crying, " Every cock on his own dunghill," with which savoury simile we will pass back to larks. The lark excels in supply of illustration, I cannot find out whether there are any ornitho- logical elements in the mudlark ; but the exhilarated disturber of our first sleep, the ravisher of knockers, is said, by what con- nection I know not, to be " sky-larking ; " the " sky," however, is now generally dropped, and the misguided " gent," sums up his exploits simply as a " lark." How the little bird we are considering came to have his title so dis- honoured, may of course be accounted for in various ingenious but unsatisfactory ways. Probably, there is some reference to the over- S6 Larks widely distributed. flow of spirits which seems to distinguish the songster. But to leave these questionable illustrations, we come to a group both obvious and happy. The early man rises with the lark. Do we want to express a pleasant combination of brightness and activity, we say such a one is as fresh as a lark. And when we have listened to the joyous flexible song of an unaffected girl, we feel we are paying no ill compliment when we say she sings like a lark. Now, there is no other bird which provides so many illustrations. The lark has touched our hearts oftener than any other songster of its size, and made the most varied and distinct impression on the memory. Larks are found all over Europe, but being hardy and prolific, survive in large numbers the war which is continually made against them. Being, as we have seen, good to eat, they are persecuted even in England, where so few small birds find their way either into the market or on to the table. Abroad, as we know, all manner of small game are sought after and cooked. I remember once,' while going down the Rhone in a steamer, being offered a bunch of raw water-wagtails to eat at one of the villages where the boat touched. Lark Shooting. 87 On some parts of the Continent the lark's curiosity is employed to destroy him. He is an inquisitive bird, and will hover over an object for the purpose of inspection. Knowing this, the sportsman fixes into the ground a little whirligig, covered with bits of look- ing glass, which he spins by means of a string. The larks, seeing the glittering machine from a great distance, hasten to investigate, and hover over it within shot. With us, they are killed for the table in winter, especially in the snow, when they congregate in large flocks, and sometimes enable the pothunter to bag several at one discharge. They are also netted in large numbers. Lark-shooting, how- ever, is carried on in some parts quite in a sportsman-like way ; I mean the birds are put up by walking the stubble, and are killed singly on the wing. This is considered good practice for young shots, and may be had best during the months of November and De- cember, if the weather be open. In frost and snow, the birds flock, and when once disturbed, will often rise to a great height, out of range, and fly away to a considerable dis- tance. But they are so fond of some spots, that, however persecuted, they are sure soon 88 Flitti7ig. to return. They love mostly warm upland soils. I remember some fields, about a mile from my home, when I was a boy, where larks were certain to be found, whatever the weather. There they sang earliest in the spring ; there they flocked when the snow fell, and the frost hardened the ground. These fields sloped towards the south. Probably most of my readers know that the lark alone of all our birds sings while on the wing, and never alights but on the ground. I say never, but I have once or twice seen a sky-lark make a bungling attempt to perch for a minute on a hedge. Its claws are not formed to grasp a twig, the hinder ones being very long. This bird, however, will some- times remove its eggs and helpless young by taking them up in its feet, when circumstances render the position of its nest dangerous. This removal of the household is strictly a " flitting." Its nest is always on the ground, and often carelessly built ; the eggs, four or five in number, vary in colour, being suited, doubtlessly, to the prevailing tint of the soil. I noticed some last year in a slate district in Cumberland, tinted exactly like the broken pieces of that material ; while in The lo7icly Nest. 89 earthy-looking soils I have observed a useful tinge of brown. We cannot but admire the Providence which enables this bird so readily to drop upon the very spot where its nest is concealed, after soaring long up in the sky, — a nest which seems to have nothing to mark its position, and which a man may sometimes search for in vain, even though he may have marked the spot within a few yards. I was much struck with this last summer. I was climbing a mountain covered with short grass, a huge stack of turf, joining the Helvellyn range ; a lark brushed up at my feet, and flew far away. Stooping down, I discovered a nest with five eggs. How could she, thought I, find this warm little home again ; this tiny hidden spot on the great mountain's breast, where for miles there was nothing but a monotonous green carpet, unbroken by bush or rock, not a path, landmark, or signpost to guide her back to her home? Nothing but the unerring instinct, unassisted by any sense, which God had given her for a guide ! Sure, thought I, here is a little parable, without words, telling those who will learn, that though to all appearance the 90 The ttnseen Guide. helpless be deserted — and It would not be in man's power to show how they could be cared for again — yet the right comforter and pro- tector will come, guided by a spirit whose ways we cannot explain, but only receive and bless. ( 91 ) POND-FISHING. OUR grand salmon-killers turn up their noses at us, but we don't care. Look at those little boys coming home in full chatter after a half-holiday's catching sticklebacks. Most of their game, it is true, has died, from having been handed about too long for inspection ; still, they have got one alive in a physic-bottle, poor beast ! — probably as much perplexed as a mermaid would be in a water-butt ; but its captors are happy as Scrope when he shot his biggest stag. Don't those boys recall your days of triumph when you caught sticklebacks ? — when you took a worm, tied him round the waist with a thread, and let him down into the middle of a shoal ? Didn't they bite, one at each end ! It was not so much of a bite, though, as a shameless gobble. Often the worm, excusably enough, threw them off when they had got half an inch of him stowed away inside ; but your stickle- back is a bold feeder, and soon gets over a 92 Catching Sticklebacks. check. One at each end, the rest fussing about, and trying to help, the two lucky fellows persevere, and swallow on till their noses meet in the midst; then you gently lift them out, and draw them off their dinners, the worm doing the same service over and over again, till he grows limp and white. From these early essays, to the finished diplomacy employed with shy, heavy carp. Pond-fishing has held its own as the favourite pursuit of thousands. Look at the floats in the tackle-shops, where a varnished pike swims in mid-air, like Mohammed's coffin between heaven and earth. Look at the floats, I say — fat, tapering, transparent. Do not they recall pleasant visions of the days you spent by the weedy moat, where the water-hen crept under the hollow bank, and the dragon-fly sat upon the bulrush ? of the dark hole beneath the willow, where the conscious cork made circles in the still water, and then sailed sideways off, or sank with unequivocal decision ? Talk of the small skill needed in any humble sport. I should like to see a deer-stalker catch moles. No, no ! We grant you all the respect you ask, ye fly-fishers ; but do not suppose every tench caught with a float is a fool, or that it is easy to fix a hook in his leather jaws, because Picking tip Worms on ye Lawn .93 you hide it with a worm instead of a hackle. In the first place, worms are not all alike ; and if you will listen for a minute, I will tell you how best to provide this first essential in pond- fishing. Take a spade, you suppose. No such thing. Wait for a clear dewy night, and then, provided with a candle and a pot of moss, step quietly on to the lawn ; there, as you hold the flame low down, you will see the subter- raneous population of the soil taking the air. With the tip of his tail left inside his door, Mr. Worm stretches himself out at full length in the cool wet grass. Some, you see, are large, coarse, and dark ; let them lie ; they might be of use, if you wanted to catch eels, but to other fish they offer small temptation. Look again : there is a superior animal, made altogether of finer clay, and quickened with purer blood. Notice his form — head elongated, tail flat, colour pinky, with a dark line running down his back. Pick him up ; he is the right sort. Yes, I thought so. You laid hold of his head, and he slipped through your fingers quick as thought, back into his hole. No — press his tail first just where it dips into the ground ; then gently taking him by the body, he will lose his presence of mind and gripe of his threshold at 94 ^'^^ Weather for Fishing. the same time, and come up easily enough. There; put him in the moss, and go on. Thus hundreds may be taken. But mind you don't stump about Hke Rumpelstilskin, or you will jar the ground, and frighten the worms back into their holes before they can be touched. To-morrow we will try for some tench. Which way is the wind ? East. Then you might as well fish with a bare boot-hook, for not a fin will you touch. No ; not east — south- west. Ah, well ! then we will try ; but I fear the sky is too bright, even though the wind is in the right quarter. What I like to see is a soft gray underflight of clouds slipping slowly along ; or a warm rain ; or a mass piling up ammunition for a thunder-storm, while the horses stand head to tail beneath the chestnuts, with mutual civility, whisking off the flies, and pounding the dusty grass. No ; the day will be too bright — the sun reigns; the hot shimmer rises from the heated soil, making the hedges tremble, as though quivering with wind ; the mown hayfield is slippery beneath the soles of your shoes, and the grasshoppers raise their strident chorus as you brush them up with your feet. No fishing to-day — we will look over the tackle, and try in the evening. Grotmdbait. 95 What line have you got ? Ah ! it is as well we didn't start at present. Just add three or four more lengths of gut ; and, please observe, don't try to tie them together when they are dry, or they will crack. Put them into your mouth, if you have no water handy. See how I manage it. Now that the gut is soft and limp, I tie the end of one piece simply on to the other, in a common knot ; then I tie the end of the second piece on to the first in the same manner ; then I pull the two free ends till the knots slip along and catch against each other. Fastened in this way, gut will neither fray nor part. Now for the rod! Yes, that will do — long, light, stiff in the hand, supple at the point, with rings not hanging loose, but fixed, and large enough to let, if need be, a kink in the line pass through. In the evening, we will try our luck. What shall we do meanwhile, do you say ? Ground-bait? Oh no; not for tench; nor often, indeed, for any fish. I remember a friend of mine who was promised a day's sport in a piece of ornamental water. He threw in store of bread and clay, mingled in orthodox pro- portion ; and coming the next morning to the spot with rod, gaff, and creel, found a dozen 96 The Clay Pond. ducks with their ends up, full of glee and his ground-bait. If you like, you may take my casting-net down to the mill, and try for a few of those dace : we want some bait for Jack. Now it is past six o'clock, and we must be off. See, the horses have left the shade, and the cows are licking up the cool grass in the middle of the meadow. It is feeding-time, and the tench will be sharp set. Here is the pond, an old clay-pit, with crumbling sides, and clear spots among the weeds, showing where the water is the deepest — -just the place for tench. Now, then ; put your rod together, and leave a good length of gut beneath the float. Bait with one of those clear-complexioned worms you found upon the grass-plot. Yes, put a big one on — if you want a big fish — and with shortened line, lower him gently by that patch of weeds. There let the float rest, and do not be in a hurry to strike when you see it move. Bustling men, who cannot work and wait, may sneer if they will at the silent patience of the angler ; what know they of the still charm which creeps over the senses, helping them to take in with half-unconscious appetite the blessed influence of evening, when the cool- speculation. 97 ness of the earth meets the sinking fire of the sunbeam, and sends an equal pulse of life through every blade and leaf. Then the watcher who stands beside the pool receives into his beinof that calm which marks the brethren of his craft. He is angling, it is true ; he speculates on the indecision of the fish, which — maybe even now deep in the cool water^ — are circling with suspicious hunger round his bait, loath to swallow, still more loath to leave, the luscious worm. Yet, mean- while, he gathers in, through open senses, store of Nature's truth ; he sees and marks, with tenacious observation, countless traits of life — the persevering industry of the insect, the sociable intelligence of the bird, the short history of the summer plant, the steady pro- gress of the growing tree, the shifting archi- tecture of the clouds, the ceaseless machinery of all around that dies to live and lives to die in perpetual succession. But, look ! there is a bite. See, the float is uneasy— makes little rings in the water. Now it moves slowly off — and dips a quarter of an inch — now it rises up, and lies on its side : that is sure symptom of a tench. Draw in your slack line, lest you hit your rod against an overhanging branch. Now, strike ! Yes, H 98 Caught. you have him. He is a fine fellow, too. See how he rolls the water up with his tail, like the blade of a revolving screw ; down again, head first ! Give him play, but by all means keep him in the midst of that clear spot. Ah ! he is yielding to the, to him, mysterious power from above. Another last dive, and then he can barely keep his head below the surface. Be quick, but gentle, with the landing- net ; tow him within its open mouth. There ; he is safe — at least, in our view of his position. No, poor fellow,' that muscular curving of your strong back is of no use to you in the new element to which you are transferred ; your slimy life among the weeds is over now ; you have swallowed your last mouthful, and must play an altogether passive part through- out your next appearance at a feast. Tench are best plain boiled ; carp are only vehicles for sauce. I remember once, when the evenings were warm, catching a number of tench long after sunset. Every fish in the pond was awake ; you could hear them " kissing," for the tench makes a small smacking noise with his coy little mouth, just like that of a neat kiss — you could hear them kissing in the weeds by the A Fishing Picnic. 99 dozen together. It was too dark to distinguish the float, so I shortened my Hne, let the bait hang about a foot beneath the surface, and landed a good basketful. Though tench generally need careful fishing, they will sometimes bite in scenes of consider- able publicity. When a lad, I used to go every year along with a large party, all boys, old and young, to a big pond about twelve miles off, which was crowded with small perch. We fished from a boat that held about a score of us. O silent shade of Izaak Walton ! the craft, when equipped, was a perfect scare-fish, combining every appearance and movement most likely to terrify the game. What with the rocking of the boat — the scrambling over the seats — the shoutinof and sigfnallina- to those on shore — the incessant splashing of fat floats, red, yellow, blue — and occasional recovery of the upper half of a rod flung bodily into the water — the paddling with our hands over the side, and the throwing in of scraps of sandwich-paper and empty bottles, the thing kept up as much disturbance as an eight-oar in a fit. But still, if the weather proved very soft and propitious, we used to catch a number H 2 lOO Carp Fishing. of eager little perch ; and now and then, strange to say, a biggish tench. On those memorable occasions, all the rest took in their rods, and let the fortunate prize-holder play his fish ; but, directly he was landed, or boated, in went the nineteen floats over the lucky spot at which he had been hooked. I need not say we never caught two running. The carp is the shyest of all pond-fish, and requires both fine tackle and careful approach. Strange as it may seem, even in places where they are accustomed to human society — as in a moat around a farmhouse — they distinguish and suspect the angler. He must not only fish for them very early in the morning, but conceal himself while he does so. Creep up behind a bush ; then with a short line and unobtrusive float, run your rod quietly out over the bank, and lower your bait without disturbance. There ; your hook is neatly covered with a lump of tough, well-kneaded paste, and you have stuck a fresh gentle on its point. The float stands motionless up, reflected double, without any slack line hang- inof in the water. It is a June morning, and very early, for the distant church-clock has just struck four. Man is asleep, breathing the loaded air of Early Stwinier Mornifigs. loi close chambers, his grimy chin and tumbled hair sunk deep in the suffocating pillow. Meanwhile, nature is awake; while you crouch behind your ambush on the moat's bank, or stand like a rifleman behind that pollard willow, you hear the lark singing as he mounts to meet the sun. See, there is a thrush with a snail in his bill ; he is looking for a stone on which to crack his breakfast. Ah, that will suit ! How he whacks the shell upon it ! pausing every now and then to catch a tighter grip of its writhing inmate. Miserable snail ! — your armour will soon be all chipped off, and you will have to slide, naked, down your captor's throat. Any one can find many of these sacrificial spots at the edge of a coppice where thrushes abound, shining as if smeared with gum, but with numerous fragments of snail-shell littered about, and bearing witness to the nature of the varnish with which the stone is covered. Look, too, at the ants — hurrying about with lots of baggage, like railway-porters five minutes before the express starts : how those pupae manage to survive such apparently rough and incessant shifting, always surprises me. Look, too, at the swallows and martins, I02 Home to Breakfast. breakfasting off the meadow, shaving the grass tops, and whipping up a mouthful at a time, thirty miles an hour. The rooks, now — I always feel an especial respect for them, they have so much of the good old-fashioned country-gentleman air about them— see what a pleasant conversational meal they are making meanwhile In that soft, newly- ploughed field. But we must be looking after our carp. Ah ! I thought we had provided the right victual even for those dainty aristocratic palates, and they have not found us out, — not yet at least. Keep low behind the bush — watch your float — -see how steadily it sweeps off — how steadily It dives. Yes, a fine fish, I declare. Bait again ; you will have another before the homestead turns out, and the yard- man stumps up to see, but spoil your sport. Put up your rod ; shoulder your fish ; and when you get home, and join the lazy sleepers, who by this time have shaved, and come down smug and brisk, "perhaps you won't" break- fast yourself, as young Bailey says in Martin Ckuzzlewit, " perhaps not ; oh no." ( I03 ) BIRD-MURDER. ^ AM glad to see the cause of the little birds taken up as it is now, not only by naturalists, periodicals, and the like, but by the Times. The eagle pleads for the wren. It is well known that small birds are very scarce in some parts of the Continent ; but their destruction is not so senseless there as it is with us. They are eaten in France and Italy. They are sold in the market by scores. Monsieur brings home his pockets full, after a day's shooting, and Madame has them hung up in the larder. Signor makes, in some places, very ingenious arrangements for the capture of small birds : he spreads a net between two trees, and seats himself high up among the branches of one of them. When the " game" approaches, he flings a stick down at it ; the poor little thing mistakes the missile for an enemy, perhaps a hawk, and, dodging down between the trees to avoid it, pops into Signor's net. This I I04 Sparrow Clubs. say, is intelligible. Signora plucks the wag- tail, and it smokes upon the board ; but our English destructives kill under a stupid mis- take. The farmer gives so much a dozen for sparrows' heads, or eggs. A sparrow club is formed, at which prizes are awarded to the destroyers of the greatest number. These thoughtless wholesale executioners are not probably aware of the mischief done, not by their victims, but by themselves. And yet it seems strange, not only that they should be so unobservant as to live in the country and remain thus ignorant of the habits of small birds, but that they should defy the accumulated testimony of naturalists. It does not speak much for the intelligence of our middle country classes when so much popular science is disseminated, and yet a number of farmers can be found to join in a systematic slaughter of some of their best friends. No doubt sparrows eat corn in harvest — indeed, more or less, when they can get it ; but they can be easily scared away during the short time that the grain is ripe for their food in the held. I want, however, to ask the destroyers of little birds, " What do you think they eat during the greater part of the year, when A Day-long Meal. 105 there is no grain ? Above all, what do they feed their young with ? " Look into a nest — see the chorus of yellow mouths wide open in blind faith. Observe their unfledged and well- filled, but most unpleasant-looking stomachs. How are they supplied } Upon what do these insatiable little gourmands live ? Insects. All day long, from daybreak to dusk, papa and mamma are flitting- backwards and forwards, from the field and the garden to the nest, and popping flies, grubs, &c., &c., into the half- dozen hungry mouths. There is no satisfying them. Their meal is day long. They take in at one mouthful as much in proportion as a man consumes during the whole of his dinner. Conceive a score of nests in the neighbour- hood of a garden. Say that a hundred mouths are being filled for twelve or fourteen hours at a time, — filled, too, as fast as they can be, — and what a removal of pernicious insects does not this represent ! Yet the countrymen kill these indefatigable scavengers, because they pick a little corn. It is not, however, during the breeding time that they transfer mischievous insects from the plant to their young broods, but before and afterwards they themselves are incessantly on the alert for grubs, and other plagues of the io6 The Appetite of Birds. farmer and the gardener. Watch a lawn, or a hedgerow, for half an hour, and see how ceaseless is the consumption of insects. The swallow snaps them up as he skims over the grass, or threads the stream. The wagtail runs right and left in a prompt, successful sort of way. Every time he makes one of those sudden little charges he has caught and dis- posed of his prey. See the thrush, with long elastic hops, busy among the vegetables. He is revelling in caterpillars, or, perhaps, he is snail-hunting. See, he has got one, and trips on one side to settle matters with him. He can't swallow a snail, shell and all ; so the thrush proceeds to get rid of this incumbrance. Seizing the snail, by what we will call the nape of the neck, he whacks him with all his might on a stone. Off comes a great piece of shell. Whack again. Poor snail ! it must be very unpleasant for you ; we won't watch the whole process. Presently, Mr. Thrush hops gaily out into the world again, with a smile on his countenance, and begins to look for another. The appetite of these birds is prodigious-, their digestion powerful and rapid. Besides those I have mentioned, think of the crowd of soft- billed birds, all grub-hunting. What numbers, whose very name is " Flycatchers ! " How Farmer Numskull. 107 many are classed under the title of " Insecti- vorse ! There are some wild birds, which, I grant you, must provoke the farmer immensely. A flock of wood-pigeons in a field of ripe peas really consume a valuable share of the expected crop. But the rook is shamefully libelled. I have read with the deepest indignation of their destruction by poison. No doubt they like a change of diet sometimes ; but if you want to know what they love, look at a field being ploughed. See how eagerly the rooks pounce down upon the fresh-turned furrow. They are then doing incalculable good to the farmer — they are saving his crop from the wire- worm ; and in return he poisons a rookery. The birds fall from their familiar trees, where they have bred and cawed in security for years. One after another yields to the mysterious influence. The many-wintered crow loses his foothold, and comes writhing down. The mother of the summer's brood drops beneath her nest. The charm of a country house is poisoned. Farmer Numskull has " sarved out them there thieves of rooks at last," he says. I'll tell you what : I wish somebody could persuade him to make a pie of a few ; a little uneasiness under that great waistcoat of his io8 Use common Observation. would serve him right ; and, if I had the curing of him when thus disturbed, I would take measures calculated to impress the recovery upon him. No homoeopathic infinitesimal doses would I prescribe; but I would give him, and repeat the dose, if he could be approached a second time, let me see — I hardly know what just now, but it should be something like a horseball. But seriously, this destruction of small birds is a grave question. In France legal measures have been taken to stop the mischief from pro- ceeding, and to remedy the past. Here, in England, the police could hardly interfere. The common sense and common observation of residents in the country must be aroused and appealed to. Above all, let the farmer reflect upon the questions, how do small birds live during that great portion of the year in which they can get no grain ? how are their broods fed ? If you really believe, as you do, that small birds affect your crop, is it not worth while to look for yourselves, and see what they and their families consume so busily during the spring } Is it not worth while to calculate what those grubs and insects would produce and consume during the summer ? And yet you destroy those quick little eyes, which alone Living Microscopes and Tweezers. 109 can spy them out, and put poison in those nimble beaks which alone can reach them. In them you have living microscopes and tweezers, which hop about and manage themselves with Inimitable accuracy and unwearied success. Do you think you could replace them with clumsy thumbs, hired at sixpence a-day ? no OUR FEATHERED VISITANTS. HERE are few facts more perplexing than the migration of birds, especially of those "which visit us in the summer. Some people who accept migration as a house- hold word, and talk about " flitting" themselves, have never thought or asked about the number of birds that migrate, which they are, whence they come, when they go. They rest their ornithological consciousness upon the swallow, but have no idea that many of the little bustling songsters which delight us in the spring have just come from abroad as well as he. The swallow is conspicuous by his domesticity and swiftness of flight. We detect his arrival at once ; he comes to our houses when he comes to our country. He is our summer guest, and sits in the chimney corner. But the crowd of his companions are to most as nameless as the chorus of a concert. The swallow is the master of the ceremonies. Everybody sees him whisk- ing about in his tail-coat, which is a sure sfgn Birds fiy Northwards to Breed. 1 1 1 that the performance is at hand or in pro- gress. Again, there are people who perhaps would say that migratory birds visit us in the surnmer : so they do, but not in the summer alone. Huge, ponderous flocks of geese and ducks come over in the winter from the Arctic regions; Norway, Sweden, and the shores of the Baltic sending us large numbers of thrushes at the same season. In fact, migration goes on throughout the whole of our year. One set comes to us in the winter, both to avoid the extreme cold of the north, and to find a sufficiency of food. Indeed, the severer the winter the larger the company — not because they like the frost, but are escaping from it. As soon as the winter moderates, this set returns to the north, whence it came, and another set arrives from the south not for warmth, although they sojourn with us during summer, but for comparative coolness. This last army is recruited over an immense area, from Guinea to France. When summer is over, they winter abroad like invalids. One impulse seems to guide this great mov- ing world of birds ; they fly northward to breed. Although some remain, and rear their young with success, the mass breed at the northern 112 Redwings and Fieldfai^es. limit of their wanderings. Why, many thoughtful naturalists are at a loss to say. There seems, for example, to be no hindrance in the way of the woodcocks' permanent residence here, for they have built and bred successfully in our heaths and desolate places ; but the main body of these birds retires to Norway about the latter end of March. The redwing and the fieldfare, too, leave us, while the thrush remains. These are all birds of the same genus ; but the former breed far away in a distant northern home, whilst the latter builds its nest in our gardens, copses, and hedges ; hopping actively about our lawns, and eating our fruit with pleasant, though irritating confidence. The apparent preference of the redwing and fieldfare for wintry weather is the more remarkable as they are delicate birds, and are not unfre- quently killed by hard frost, like their cousins the thrushes. During one severe season. Bishop Stanley tells us that he found dead redwings in greater numbers than any other birds. Sometimes they have come over to the north- east coast of Britain, followed so suddenly by hard weather, that it was evident that they were escaping from its pressing severity. It seems, however, a pity, that if they leave Norway in the winter for warmth, some one Hedge Popping. 113 could not give them a hint of the warmer weather to be found south of our country. But, then, schoolboys and hedge-poppers in general would lose their head winter-game. Talking of this, I have often wondered at the restless nervousness of fieldfares. They are the most inaccessible of middle-class birds. You see a dozen on a bare tree, and (I speak as a boy) tucking your gun under your jacket, and yourself under a hedge, crawl with a beating heart, and triangular rents in your back, just near enough to be out of shot, when they cackle off. The Norwegians must be a fidgety persecuting race, to make the Avinter visitor.'i from their woods so fearful of man. Per- haps, however, there may be some biography popular among fieldfares, representing England as peopled with crouching, bloodthirsty school- boys. These birds, Mr. Hewitson tells us, unlike our English thrushes, make a community of nests in the great pine-woods where they breed. Redwings are stated to frequent the shores of the Baltic during the summer. Not only, however, does the great impulse to move northward for the purposes of breeding seem unaccountable when half the thrushes only obey it, but the exception is observed in I 114 Capricioiis Migration. the case of several other birds. The crow may be considered an estabhshed resident. The disappearance, however, of one species from portions of England during the summer continues to puzzle naturalists. White of Selborne, who retains his cha- racter for honest observation, says : " Royston or gray crows are winter birds that come much about the same time with the woodcock ; they, like the fieldfare and redwing, have no apparent reason for migration, for as they fare In the winter like their congeners, so might they, in all appearance, in the summer." To this, Jesse adds a note, that "the Royston crow breeds and is stationary on all the west coast of Scotland ; and It Is probable that most of those which visit Engrland durlnor winter arrive from Sweden and Norway." Here is a strange exception to the domestic habits of a family. The swallow, again, affords another Instance of a seemingly needless devia- tion from a great rule. These birds come from a warmer climate, but, as it would seem, not necessarily because they cannot rear their families elsewhere. Bishop Stanley tells us of a person who resided for seven years on the west coast of Africa, whence some of our swallows visit us. Swallows. 1 1 5 and who found that many remained there all the year. Their numbers, he says, diminished from spring to autumn, when they were sup- posed to be absent in Europe ; but enough remained to show that they were not obliged to migrate by any imperative universal neces- sity. The great feature, however, of migration, as observed in England, seems to be that birds fly northward to breed. Wild ducks which escape from the sharp, unbroken, wintry frosts of Lapland to feed on our comparatively mild coasts, return there in the spring, and form huge breeding-colonies during the short Arctic summer. Summer visitants leave various parts of Africa, and probably some districts in Spain, from May to September, more or less, to rear their young in the cooler climate of Great Britain. There are about forty of these summer visitants to some twenty-five of the others, the swallow being, as I have noticed, the best known ; and yet he has caused more perplexity and discussion than any other. It is now established beyond doubt that swallows migrate ; but so accurate an observer as Mr. White of Selborne seems to have often inclined to the opinion that many of them remain here in a torpid state during the winter. No one I 2 1 16 Unaccountable appearance of Swallows. can turn over his charming book without being struck with the doubt, and almost anxiety, he showed about the matter. The discovery of single or clustered swallows deliberately com- mitted to a state of sleep, has, I believe, never been made certain. There seems always to have been an element of doubt in the evidence. Either they have turned out to be bats, or died so immediately after artificial reviving, as to suggest a suspicion of some unnatural weak- ness as the cause of their detention here. There is, indeed, an accepted anecdote of some martins who plastered up a late-born brood, which remained throughout the winter in the nest, coming out fresh and healthy in the spring ; but nothing has been found to shake the evidence of their annual migration. No doubt it is strange that solitary birds should make their appearance sometimes on an unseasonably warm day in early spring, or even mid-winter. This must have been frequently noticed, or we should not have had the proverb, that " one swallow does not make a summer." Markwick says he once saw on the 8th of December two martins flying about very briskly, the weather being mild. He had not seen any considerable number either of swallows or martins for a good while before. Martins. 1 1 7 Still, swallows have been watched migrating. They have been observed setting off; numbers have been met with at sea. They have even been accused of weariness when newly alighted on their arrival here in the spring ; but there can be no necessity for their fatigue, since they might come from Africa with only two short passages across the Straits of Gibraltar and the Channel. The matter of a hundred miles or so is nothing to a swallow. The martin who flashes by your window could whisk over half the county while you are eating your breakfast; but he has set his little chirping heart upon a particular spot under the eaves of your house ; and by the time winter is gone, and you let the fire out In the middle of the day, and leave the great-coat hung up in the hall, he does not overshoot the mark of his home — not he ; you hear his liquid sociable chirrup, as he rubs up his memory with a flitting inspection of the old nook. Sand martins almost invariably come first, and apparently skim over the familiar pond as soon as they arrive with as easy an air of possession and facility of flight as if they had never left it. Perhaps, however, within the week they were whipping up insects off the swamps of Guinea, and taking a bird's-eye 1 1 8 Powers of Bird Flight. view of the slave-trade. The speed at which some of this tribe fly is almost incredible. It has been calculated that the swift can get over nearly i8o miles an hour; i.e., he could cross the Channel from Dover to Calais, and come back again, while you were walking from Port- land Place to Pall Mall. What would not the Geographical Society give for such powers of locomotion ? The bird that twitters in the chimney of their committee-room, knows quite as much about the veritable Mumbo Jumbo as he does about Sir Roderick Murchison ; and could tell the savants as much about the Niger as about the Serpentine. It has, I believe, never been ascertained whether the old swallows lead their young ones on their first long journey; if not, as is likely enough, for these birds do not always depart in a body, the instinct of migration appears the more remarkable. Still, I like to fancy, that as troops are paraded before a march, so the autumn gatherings of swallows and martins on bare branches and roofs have something to do with the coming event, and that the old birds give public lectures on geography before the season is over, and society breaks up for its autumnal travels.. But the great question is, where do the Feeble Fliers. 119 feebler birds of passage go ? — the redstarts, wagtails, blackcaps, &c. See what a business they make of flying across a big field ; how they labour and jerk ; how gladly they seem to alight, pitching down into the opposite hedge at the risk of sprained ankles. These little creatures flit rather than fly. How do they manage the long journeys of migration } It has been computed that a sparrow could fly three thousand miles In a fortnight, " at leisure, and without the least fatigue." I fancy, how- ever, that such a trip would take the "bounce" out of him. In fact, he does not shift his quarters, though he extends them. During the last century, the sparrow has spread gradu- ally over Asiatic Russia, towards the north and east, always following the progress of culti- vation. He is the farmer's bird. Where the land is broken, there he comes, but he does not migrate. He does not throw light on the movements of the warblers. One great assistance to the delicate birds of passage which jerk about our coppices and gardens is the wind ; they frequently come north with the south-east wind in the spring. The change in the weather which marks their advent facilitates their flight. Once fairly off, with a good I20 Tendei"- Birds. breeze astern, even a blackcap can make very respectable way. It is not probable, however, that the tender birds come far. It appears that some are found in Spain, and have only to cross the Channel ; but it is likely enough that a portion of these have been taken or observed on their way to and from the north of Africa, the great winter retreat of the European summer visitants. White, who thinks that few of our tender birds leave our continent, was greatly pleased to see among the collection of birds from Gibraltar some of those short-winged English summer birds of passage concerning whose departure we have made so much inquiry. " Now, if," he goes on to say, '* these birds are found in Andalusia to migrate to and from Barbary, it may easily be supposed that those that come to us may migrate back to the continent, and spend their v/inters in some of the warmer parts of Europe. This is certain, that many soft-billed birds that come to Gibraltar appear there only in spring and autumn, seeming to advance in pairs towards the northward, for the sake of breeding during the summer months, and retiring in parties and broods towards the south at the Birds Migrate by Night. 121 decline of the year ; so that the rock of Gibraltar is the great rendezvous and place of observation from whence they take their departure each way towards Europe or Africa." In short, it seems that some of the deli- cate summer birds which flit, go a little further south than the others, but that none go beyond the north of Africa. Their migration is the more puzzling, as they are seldom seen on the move ; they come and go unperceived. One spring-day we still feel the sting in the tail of winter ; on the next, the wind shifts towards the south, and we hear the shrill but cheerful note of the wryneck, or cuckoo's leader. Curiously enough, these small birds migrate in the dark. Jesse says that they not only traverse vast seas and continents— he is re- ferring to those which shift from England to Africa — but they take their departure at night; for they have been found dead in light- houses, having flown against the strong light. But what an estimate does this give us of the irresistible impulse of migration ! We know how punctually and anxiously little birds put themselves to bed, and tuck themi- selves in, in the evening. Did you never stir 122 They wait for a Wind. the shrubs about the garden on a summer's night, and startle out bewildered little fellows, which slept till they were almost touched ? And yet on some chilly autumn night we must believe that these domestic guests, which flit from hedge to hedge, and hop under the bushes out of our sight, rise up in a body, and make straight off, through the black wilderness of sky, for the north of Africa or south of Spain, without a compass or a map, in the dark, and guideless ! There is one thino; which these little birds cannot stand, and that is a chain of mountains. The Alps appear to divide the migration of European birds. Moreover, the feebler sort are seriously influenced by the wind. As I have said, a fair wind brings over troops of them ; but it has been noticed that when west or north-west winds have prevailed for some time in the spring, there are few arrivals of our immigrants ; but that when the south-east wind blows, that corner of England, at all times the country of songsters, is full of them. I have wondered at some of the delicate songsters coming here, and with liquid defiance of sore throat, beginning their spring-notes in a shrewd east wind ; but the wind really has brought them over. o Cock Birds co7ne First. 123 It seems that summer birds do not go far Inland on arriving ; this accounts for their abundance in East Angha. Some work their way north and west, but others give a constant preference to the first part of the island they meet with ; the nightingale leaving many dis- tricts north and west unexplored, and being content to sing his song to the clodhoppers in the dull flat seaboard of Essex rather than the ofroves of Devonshire. The cock-birds apparently come first : this is known to bird-catchers, who value their earliest captives accordingly. When the hens come, the cocks look out for their mates by singing. That excited inflation of the throat, those emotional quiverings of the body, are the natural fine airs of the early songster to win a bride. The female glow-worm hangs out her lamp, and the male, a dingy, unpoetical snob, crawls up to make his bow ; but the sinpfine bird challenofes the admiration of the opposite sex, and the rivalry of his own, like a troubadour. When one comes to think of it, what variety appears in the life of a migatory bird ; nay, what a number of lives are crowded into his little existence. In the first place, he is a natural inhabitant of two quarters of the 124 Renewed Yoidli. globe ; he is at the same time an African and a European. He is faithful in wedlock, and yet has the experience of a number of wives without widowhood, jealousy, or complaint. He rears his family with care, seeing his sons and daughters off in the world, and able to support themselves ; then he reappears with all the glow of youth, and woos a coy and twittering mate with artless, virgin enthusiasm. In the autumn he is a fussy and experienced paterfamilias, somewhat the worse for wear, with children precocious and exacting, as big as himself. Next spring he is a gay young bachelor, with freshened energies and vesture. He has indeed grown old, but he grows young again. He casts his plumage, and loses his voice ; but in the spring he begins the career of life again with all the labour and beauty of youth. No wigs or false teeth for him. It is as if an old man had found an intermittent elixir, and passed through the stages of thoughtless love and loving care again and ao^aln. Besides the regular orthodox migrations from one country or continent to another, there are many movements among birds which can be accounted for only on similar grounds. There is the flocking of some species which Separation by M^itiial Consent. 125 remain with us the whole year. They change their whereabout, in company, for the sake of food. One remarkable feature of the winter flockine of these resident birds is the division of the sexes. Thus chaffinches separate, hens and cocks forming separate flocks. These migrate, too, partially, moving from one place in the same country to another. This takes place in the winter, when many of their summer associates have left their shores for warmer weather. This separation of the sexes, and, indeed, change from a married to a single life, would probably, in the opinion of selfish old bachelors, be a great recommendation to bird-society. Sometimes we see a young couple wholly wrapped up in one another. Edwin cares for no society but Angelina's ; Angelina despises all balls since she danced with Edwin ; the dear couple marry, and decline society. After a while they would be glad to accept the invitations, &c., which at first they refused. Of course this is very exceptionable and wrong ; but the chafifinches provide against it. Through the wooing and the wedding, the bird-world is to them taste- less and flat. They bill and coo ; they eat caterpillars and grubs off the same twig ; they flutter through the garden in dual delight ; 126 Partial Mi (rr at ion ^> but they grow tired of it. Edwin ceases singing ; Angelina ceases to reciprocate. All at once they separate on the best of terms. Edwin joins a party of gentlemen like himself, who club together ; Angelina consorts with her sex, till they all get tired of the change itself in turn, and pair again. The only thing like it in human life is the separation of the sexes after dinner. There is another semi-migration among birds : I mean the retreat from the homestead to the wood during the summer months. Summer is not the time for robins — we seldom see them ; but other birds seek the quiet of the forest more utterly than they. There is also a suspected migration of some birds during the summer from one part of England to another. On the whole, it seems as if all who had the means of locomotion, whether in the shape of wings or railway tickets, took a change in the autumn ; showing surely that constant residence in the same spot is not only unpleasant, but unnatural. ( I-v ) STARLINGS. iHE starling is a common but a pecu- liar bird ; it is at the same time sociable and reserved. Some of our feathered friends live near man ; but, though we are pleased to watch and welcome them, their familiarity is not always essentially amiable. The robin, for instance, which draws so close to us in winter, and will sit on the snow-powdered window-sill, and look steadily into the room with a half-remonstrant air, as if surprised at our not having already thrown some crumbs out for him, is a fierce, quarrel- some little gentleman. He wall fight his fellows, friends and strangers alike. His very confidence has a dash of audacity about it. The sparrow, too, who makes himself so free about our yards, is an uncourteous, impudent fellow at times. He is dirty and rude. In- deed, he is altogether too bold and coarse to become much of a favourite ; besides, he can't sing. Thus his audacity is not, like the 128 Sociability of Staidings. robin's, tempered by any accomplishment. The starling, on the contrary, is often very confiding, and is easily domesticated ; but his sociability is not marred by rudeness. He is very playful with his own kind, and lives on excellent terms with several other birds. When he makes friends with man, he ap- proaches with a gentle reserve. He trusts us, but he will not intrude. He never insists on attention, like the robin, or commits any breach of good manners, like the greedy vulgar sparrow. He is clean and civil ; when other birds quarrel on a muck-heap, or rob our fruit-trees, he will walk about our lawns with a quiet, business-like air, looking for insects, larvae, and worms, interfering with no one. His very gait is quiet. The starling does not hop, nor does he run about like the wag- tail, but walks with a swift easy motion. No doubt there is a good reason for this : probably he moves about thus because his prey is small, and might be missed if he took such bounds as the thrush, which seems to prefer snails and slugs. These last are large objects, and not easily overlooked. The starling, however, would gain nothing by bouncing over his feeding-ground. Probably, too, being a much Starlings are Ha7nnlcss. 129 heavier bird than the robin, for instance, if he were to hop, he would give warning of his approach to worms, which are very quick in detecting any vibration of the ground. De- pend upon it, there is a reason for everything, whether we can detect it or not. The starHng has been accused of sucking pigeons' eggs ; but I fully believe this to be a slander. He has been seen flying out of dovecots in the laying season ; but this is because he sometimes builds his nest there, and is looking after the business of his own eggs alone. We had a very large pigeon- house near our own, with breeding-holes for many hundred pigeons, and yet, though the starlings used to frequent it, I never found a pigeon's ^' religious element there Is one full of anxiety and disturbance. Few men are seriously ill without some apprehension or care about the possible issue of their sickness. Many are then conscious of their immortality, with per- haps a vague but strong conviction that all is not well between themselves and their conscience. To these the minister of g-ood news should be able to give comfort. To all, the ministrations of religion should be wel- come. But the greatest care and kindness is needed, lest what should have been for their health become a source of depression or dis- tress. I am afraid that sick people are sometimes sorely vexed and hindered in their recovery by an injudicious application of religious treatment. They are neither restored to health in this world nor helped to enjoy everlasting life in that which is to come. I will venture then, with the consciousness of many years experience in this matter, to say a few words about the nice and important business of spiritual nursing. And what I say applies not only to the official duty of the parson, but to the affectionate endeavours of the relig^ious friends of the sick man. The spirit in which the sick man should be addressed upon his mental state is set forth in Peace. 257 the first words which the minister Is directed to use in the office for the Visitation of the Sick. The rule is this. The minister of the parish coming into the sick person's house shall say, " Peace be to this house and to all that dwell in it." Whether or no the minister shall deem it expedient to use these words, they teach the object and spirit of his business there. To many he is gladly welcome. And by the exercise of his duty he supplements the work of the physician and the nurse. There are not a few sick persons who long to relieve themselves by confidential intercourse with some one whom they can trust ; who can listen to the tale of their mental distress without being shocked, and who has an official claim to hear, if need be, what they would have much hesitation and delicacy in uttering to those with whom they have been intimate all their lives, and whose estimate of their motives miofht be mistaken. And this opportunity for spiritual relief greatly assists the physical means being used for their recovery. There are sick people whose soul resents the nursing and doctoring with which they are plied, because they have a mind diseased. 258 spiritual Ntir sing. One, who knew what was in man, thus addressed a sufferer brought to him for a cure. " Son, be of good cheer, thy sins be forgiven thee." It is hard to heal the body when the soul is obstinately sore. Many a doctor has been puzzled and put out by the apparent stubbornness of a disease, when really the difficulty arose, not from inaccessibility of the affected organ or the nerve, but from a torturing ulcer in the conscience. Here then there is need of spiritual nursing. And the person who attempts it must use the same principles as I have advocated through- out this paper. He must treat the sufferer with sympathy and hope. He must treat sin as a disease just as truly as fever is, or any other bodily sickness. He must be no more shocked or indignant than the nurse who dresses the sore and cleanses the foul source of the discharge. There is in the worst man, who has gone most clearly against conscience and counsel, a capacity for recovery and spiritual health. I am not here going to speak of the religious recipe he will apply. I only plead for sym- pathy and hope in its application. As no good nurse will scold her patient, so no parson who is fit for his post will rebuke the sinful suffering Sympathy. 259 soul. He will appeal to that spirit divine which is wholly extinguished in none, and honestly associate himself with the guiltiest both in his prayers and exhortations. I need hardly add that he will avoid, like poison, any religious dispute by a sick-bed. How^ would you, reader, like a theological argument when you were on your back to beo;in with ? If the sick man is hard and quarrelsome, he will not be softened by a iire of sharp texts. Of all moral cruelty none seems to me more devilish than to twit the prostrate sufferer w^ith his faults, in the name of the Lord ; and to load with condemnation him who is already burdened with suffering and sin. Love alone, not mere theological love, but love in the eye and the voice, can reach, convict, and brine comfort to the hardened. But beside the direct application of what may be called religious treatment, the spiritual nurse may do very much for the mental comfort of the sufferer. We may strip the saying " I was sick and ye visited me" of all ecclesiastical and con- ventionally religious dress and yet find it deeply divine. Spiritual nursing need not involve the talking to a sick man about his s 2 2 6o Visiting of the Sick. soul. It may be done effectually by the con- tagion of that God-given influence which flows from a good-hearted man, whose hopeful presence cheers the sad heart. The spirit of the august sentence I have quoted may be fulfilled by little acts of kindness done from a heart which stays upon God, acts of kindness done, not to the poor alone, but to sufferers amxong our own kith and kin, in our own circle, within our own society. Thus both the parson and the friend may be in the highest sense a spiritual nurse to the sick man ; where it seems advisable, holding intimate converse with him about the disease which affects his soul, but in any case showing tenderness and comfort fresh from a godly heart. For if hopeful, decisive, considerate treatment is always wholesome in a sick-room, it is most blessed and contaQ^ious when it springs from deep, conscious communion with the Great Giver of Peace and Life. We cannot conclude these thoughts about nursing without seeing how widely the word has been used. We nurse projects, prejudices, quarrels — and a very vigorous maturity do these last two sometimes rapidly gain ; an infant grievance, a childish offence, is capable, with care, of growing up into a war, of setting Infant TJiought. 261 the world In flames. How great a matter a little fire kindleth. But I don't want to dwell over these. All I can say is, that if a young suckling of a quarrel be born to you, expose it, strangle it, apply the most effectual form of infanticide you ever heard of, or some day it will grow beyond your management and wish. But remember, in regard to the nursing of thoughts and projects, that the very same principle as I have advocated still applies. Force nothing, or it will either grow crooked or die soon. Give an infant thought plenty of play ; let it run about in the fields ; and. If It is to grow, the unconscious mother of all growth will help it on. You will find fresh matter accumulate around the original idea ; and some day, the once baby may be sent out Into the world full-grown, to make its way with such a constitution and brain-power as it may have inherited from you its parent. ( 262 ) TEMPER. 'HERE are many kinds of temper, and I am in no humour to classify them categorically. The moment, how- ever, that I summon the crowd of varieties to my mind, the phlegmatic generally presents itself first (probably because it is too slow to have gone far), as the most permanently irri- tating. There is no excuse whatever for a man who cannot be provoked. His native excellence is in itself vexatious. Not only does he get a character for good nature under false pretences — being considered amiable by shallow observers — but he is directly and per- sonally objectionable to those who really know him. He sets up a fallacious test of goodness. The mischief he does is double : he perverts the judgment of the multitude, and exhausts the patience of the man. Reflect for a moment. He cannot be provoked. There is some unna- tural defect in his constitution. It is small The Phlegmatic Man. 263 praise to a broken-legged soldier to say that he didn't run away; it is equally meaningless to extol a phlegmatic man for never being angry. I dare say he would be angry if he could ; but he can't, and I wish I might say there was an end of the matter. No such thing : he is as obstructive and provoking as a street that is blocked up ; he checks the rush of feeling with no soft word, but with dogged motionless hindrance ; he fails in that unde- finable but respondent sympathy which is mortar to the bricks of society; he is per- sistently unfeeling ; he will be neither with you nor against you ; and perhaps his only use is to perfect the temper of saints, who must not only be tried by the froward and malicious, but survive the searching ordeal of dull in- difference. I take next a character in many respects unlike this last, but one with also much nega- tive power of provocation — I mean the com- pliant man. He is unpleasantly pleasant ; he responds, if that may be called response, with so little capacity for opposition. You deliver an opinion ; he assents with a smile, and will do the same to your opponent. The sportsman does not value a fish which yields immediately to the pull of the line. An easy capture is an 264 The Compliant Man. ill -compliment to the angler; you prize a re- monstrant little fish far more than a great scaly sluQfofard who suffers himself to be towed at once into the landing-net, and gapes out imme- diate submission the moment he feels the point of your argument. Just so the compliant man disappoints you : you suspect your own reasons when they are at once assented to. Your wit is thrown away unless it has a little tussle for supremacy. You have said a rich thing ; he laughs, but in a tone of vacant readiness which shows that he would have done the same at a poor one. You ask him to carry all the um- brellas at a picnic, to ring the bell, to sit at a side-table, to fill a gap — he complies, gratefully. Anything to make himself agreeable — forget- ting, kind soul, that of man's aims and capa- bilities, this perhaps is not the highest. How- ever, he piques' himself upon his amiability, and must take the consequence. I think the compliant man is most disagreeable when you try to take him into confidence. He shuts his book to listen ; he lays down his knife and fork; he lets his soup grow cold ; he runs the risk of losing the train. Well, you make the first move : you look oppressed, mysterious, sympathetic, and you begin. Before you can disclose your intentions, he approves of them. Before you False Amiability. 265 can deliver your mind, he hugs it in his embrace. He swallows your words as they come out of your own mouth, and still yearns with receptive amiability. Nothing can choke him. He is affected, interested, he will hear all you want to say; but you go through him like water through a sieve. He takes in all you give, and gets rid of it at once. But perhaps the worst effect of his compliance is, that you cannot really gratify him, or do him a kindness. He has not will enough of his own to appre- ciate unselfishness or generosity. He is not obstinate enough for you to do him a civility. If you ask him, quite sincerely, whether he will have a leg or a wing, he will resign the responsibility of the answer. Either — which you please. Confound him ! How can you please a man who has no choice of pleasures ? Next, of all people who provoke us, few are more tiresome than those \vho will never do anything thoroughly. Let us call theirs the hesitating temper. Their actions are incom- plete. A natural deficiency of brain-structure mars their deeds. They leave the door open ; they always remember something to be done just as they are leaving the house, and spoil the effect and good augury of the departure 266 The Hesitating Temper. by running back for a pocket-handkerchief, a memorandum-book, or a final order to the waiter. But the worst of it is, they won't let others do what they want right off. A matter has been settled. It is an immense fact and saving of time to accept decisions ; it clears the way. A small thing done is some- times better than a big one prepared or in preparation. These hesitating tempers, how- ever, won't let the small thing do itself The matter, as I said, has been settled, dismissed. Then they say : Oh ! but . The luckless decision is caught by the last joint of its tail, just as it was going steadily and safely out of the room— caught by the last joint of its tail, pulled back all flustered and rampant to have a smut rubbed off its nose. Plague on it, let it go with the smut ! As it is, the charm of the launch is spoiled. These people, too, won't eat or drink in a complete way. They put back, ask you to take back a piece. They will have " Only half a glass, please." They will be helped " pre- sently." They affect a combination of meals, tea and dinner, say, and a cloth over half the table. They save the fly-leaves of notes for memoranda, and mourn over a wholesale clear- ance of old papers. They dread nothing Sulks. 267 more than a final decision of little things, and whatever they do, leave some part designedly- unfinished. The above defects, however, are Infinitely less trying than those of the sulky, uncertain temper. You may depend, In some sense, upon a phlegmatic, compliant, or a minutely cautious man ; you know what he will do on any given occasion ; you may shape your course accordingly. But the sulky, treache- rous temper defies calculation. All at once, a cloud comes over the face. You have unwit- tingly touched some sore, and he sulks. There is no honest anger, no blaze, but the coals are alight In the mine, and generally you must wait till they are burned out. You can't get at the hidden heat. It smoulders on; all work Is stopped, though the outside looks much the same as usual. Give me a man who. If angry, will flare up. It Is very disagreeable and provoking this sometimes ; but if the temper is there, let it come to the top as soon as may be, bubble away, boil over, and be gone. It is best, no doubt, to check your anger, and bite it down. It Is well to stop it with a jerk, a painful efibrt, If need be, pulling the curb of the temper sharp. But if it defies your power, or eludes 268 The Horscbreaker. your presence of mind, the sooner it exhausts itself the better. I have heard that there is no remedy for a runaway horse so effective as a flogging. He must needs gallop ; well, my friend, then gallop. I have a good pair of spurs on — in they go. I have a whip, hard, pliant, heavy — lay on thick. Here is a nice steep hill — up we go. Here is a deep- ploughed field — Oh yes, keep up your pace, and how do you like it ? I remember a horse- dealer, who always cured a fault by indulging it. He had once a brute sent to him which occasionally stood still. Farmer Waistcoat had flogged him, and he would not move for an hour. Well, this man took the beast, put him in his break, and drove off. In ten minutes he came to a dead stand. Breaker said nothing, did nothing. Horse didn't quite know what to reply, tried to look back with his ears, waited half an hour, and then began to move on. No, my friend, said the breaker; you stay here all day. The farmers passed him going to market with uncomplimentary greetings. What, can't yo2i make him move ? Breaker doesn't look put out, though. Tck ! Farmers drive on, show their samples, dine at the ordinary, and jog home a trifle merrier, late in the afternoon. Breaker still there, master Respect paid to Cross People. 269 of the position. The horse never stopped again. So may we sometimes treat human temper. Put upon the compliant man till he is ashamed of himself; give the sulky something to sulk about. A soft answer does not turn away all wrath — not, for instance, a bully's wrath ; on the contrary, a hearty blowing up is likely enough to bring him to his senses, if so be it is administered with zest — plainly, unsparingly, without passion or malice, but without any affectation of pity or reserve. Let him get more than he brings. He is a bouncing fool, who will be a tyrant if permitted. Don't permit him, but give him the hardest meta- phorical punch on the head you can. It has a wonderful and speedy effect. He will stop, and gape, and probably end by saying he didn't mean it, which last word may as well be flatly contradicted, to finish him up with. The respect which is gained, or rather the obedience which is exacted by a cross man, is frequently noticed. It is, however, impos- sible to force it. No good-tempered man can thus act severity and get his own way ; you must be naturally cross to succeed. And then, being naturally cross, it becomes a question whether you really enjoy the full flavour of 270 Passion. concessions. No ; I think you had better rather be put upon sometimes than be always arbitrary and dominant. There is genuine pleasure in yielding to another, in resigning your rights. Of course I don't mean always, because then you would at last have no rights to resign. They must have at least sufficient protection to give a value to their resignation. If you cut off your hand, you can't shake a friend's. But let us pass on. Talking of temper, have we not all felt how truly fits of anger are called passion. We suffer ; it seems as if an alien spirit snatched us up and whisked us out of ourselves before we could stop him. We don't get angry on purpose ; we don't light the fire in the boiler, and blow the coals, and listen for the first simmerings of the heat. No. We are in a passion. The mighty mysterious influence, which will, suddenly perhaps, drop us all flustered and ashamed of ourselves, comes on like a squall. Oh yes, we know very well it is wrong ; no one suffers from his passion more than the passionate man. It usually thwarts his object, putting him at a disadvantage ; it exhausts his energy, and even if he manages to escape a quarrel, leaves him to be angry with himself He feels his mistakes sooner Hoijj to Check Anger. 271 than others, and, no doubt, for this reason, we sometimes deal more gently with him than with the stubborn, sulky, and compliant. A passionate man is often loved. The impul- siveness which exposes him to the spirit of anger has its influence in promoting generous, unselfish kindness. He is warm-hearted, though he boils over occasionally. The com- mon culinary advice in such a case — namely, to take the pot off the fire — may perhaps convey to him the best lesson in the management of his susceptible temper : he must avoid provocation. When he feels the temperature rising, the best thing he can do is to whisk himself off at once, before it be too late. We must use common vulo^ar expedients to achieve great results. With a slate and pencil, we may calculate our lati- tude and longitude ; the pickaxe leads to gold ; the poet-laureate must fill his inkstand ; Stephenson must oil his locomotive, or all his genius is barren. So we may not despise small causes when we try to check or guide anything so important to us as temper. A little paltry care, a word swallowed, a rising sentence stifled or struck down in us by some simple rule, may at least save us from humilia- tion, if not secure a victory. ( 272 ) POKING THE FIRE. iOTHING can be more irritating than the feeble, incomplete way in which some people poke their fires, I cannot bear to look at them. But I don't know which is worse, the indecisive " potter," or the ignorant, inartistic " smash " which batters down the pregnant covering of caked coal into black confusion, letting the precious materials of a blaze escape unignited up the chimney. To stir a fire pei^fectly, requires the touch of a sculptor, the eye of an architect, and the wrist of a dentist. I never saw it done thoroughly well above a dozen times in my life ; and though there are approximations, more or less distant, within the reach of ordinary men, do not suppose that the process is a simple one, capable of being performed in a single operation. There is the tap, when the fire has eaten into the heart of a big upper boulder-coal, and Phases of Fire-poking. 273 its opening chinks require but a slight shock to part, and let the imprisoned flame spring forth. There is the lift, when the poker acts as a lever to the crust, and lets the rich loosened fragments drop into the red-hot cavern. There is the stir universal, when the mass has been left too long, and requires a thorough mixinof. There is the ventilatinof poke, when the roof of the fabric has fallen heavily in, and the struggling flame has hardly power enough to overcome the incumbent mass. In this case the poker must be moved slowly, and left for a minute between the bars after the movement has been made. In con- trast to all this is the procedure of a woman ; who is thus defined by an Irish archbishop : " woman, a creature who does not reason, and \\\io pokes the fire from the topT Then there are side pokes, and indeed many varieties of treatment adapted to the state of the patient : for a fire is a living friend, though a capricious one, and must be managed with respect and affection. A friend, ay ! Does he not glance a bright welcome when you enter your room of a morning } Is he not glad and merry when you come home ^ Does he not wink at you out of the window, when you mount the door-step ? Is he not quiet and T 2 74 ^^^<^ Fij'e is a Friend. considerate in your study or sick chamber ? If you are dreamy, and sit with feet on fender, does he not sympathise with you, building fairy grottos, and peopling them with fantastic shapes, to suit and soothe your mood ? A friend ! I should think so. He is kind even when you turn your back upon him. But I grieve to see the unfeeling way he is often treated after months of closest intimacy. You have sat by his side ; you have talked with him by the hour together ; you have held your hands over him, as if you blessed him ; you have looked into his heart through all the dull dead winter, and found it ever warm ; and then, when fickle, gaudy summer comes, and the sun peers into the room, catching the fire's eye with an insulting stare, is it to be wondered at if he sometimes slips out in the sulks ? You should have humoured him a little — drawn down the blind, and not left him alone to eat his heart up in neglect. Putting on coals, too, is a delicate process. A good healthy fire does not much mind a heavy meal, but a dyspeptic requires to be fed with caution. The surest way, though a slow one, is to take up a lump at a time, in the tongs, and build a loose cairn above the feeble blaze. How quickly the flames search' the Putting on Coals. 275 black interstices, and change the dead mass into a pyramid of life ! It is marvellous how- soon a coy spark may be thus coaxed into a steady unequivocal fire. Coals ought not to be very big, but about the size of potatoes — the smaller ones choke and stunt the natural progress of the flame. I do not wonder at the freedom of the grate being made a test of friendship. You cannot trust an acquaintance to touch your fire. It is not only impertinent, but often unfeeling in him to attempt it. A hearth is a sacred place. Nothing accounts more easily for the absence of domesticity among many foreigners, than their want of open grates. That can hardly be a home which is warmed by an invisible fire in the bowels of a great dead-looking stove. It is not worth protecting. Who would die fighting for an Arnott ? No, no — the successive and contradictory advertise- ments of patent stoves assure me that the Briton has not yet accommodated himself to so unconstitutional a machine. He cannot find any to suit him, and I humbly trust he never will. Wood fires are better than stoves ; they can be poked — indeed, properly managed, they emit an excellent warmth, and crackle well. But about the right way of burning logs. T 2 276 Wood Fires. Piling them up is simple enough, and a right genial hearty act it is ; but many miss the power of a wood fire by having the ashes frequently cleared away. Leave them there — let them accumulate for a week ; then, if you will, keep them within bounds ; but let there always be a mound or bed on which the log may lie. They warm a room well ; indeed, they never go quite out, though they look white and cold by early daylight. Some time ago, when staying at Rome, the frost was very sharp, and we had large wood fires. Dominico, our man, never cleared the ashes away. The first thinof in the morninof he used to stick a number of canes into the ash-heap, and, lo ; in a few minutes there was a bright blaze. All the associations, too, of a wood fire are pleasant : there is the riving of logs with wedores — work for the brain of a mathe- matician, as well as exercise for his body ; there is the picking up of odd bits of sticks in the plantation, saying, " there, that will do for the fire," and then coming in and feeding it yourself. There is a prosperous look about a woodstack, and well-stored basket of sawn billets in the corner of the room. These materials, indeed, are more pleasing than the best double-screened Wallsend. There' is Fire-irons. 277 nothing hearty in the appearance of a coal- hole. I cannot bear polished fire-irons. Polished grates may sometimes add to the effect of a well-built, well-kept fire, but the ends of the tools should be black. Never stuff up the grate with ornaments ; hang something in front, if you will, but have the fire always laid. Then, on a wet, chilly, July evening, you can indulge the sudden hunger for a blaze, by the aid of a lucifer, at once. But the poker itself — what an apt, multifarious piece of furniture ! Not only has it a normal sphere and use of its own, for which, by the way, it should not be made too blunt at the point, but it is a test of physical power and manual dexterity. Such and such a man, we hear, can break a poker on his arm, or bend it round his neck. In this there is not only the appeal to common experi- ence, for who — what Englishman at least — is ignorant of a poker ? but a pleasant vision of the feat. We behold the fire round which the athletes sit, over their wine ; we hear the con- versation stray to deeds of prowess ; we see the ready means of illustration present on the spot — the extemporised performance. Then, too, what a ready weapon of offence or defence is supplied in the poker ! What more 278 Foolish, indeed, My Dear! handy ? It is a national instrument — the British poker. When the Yorkshire jury acquitted the man who knocked down his wife with it, giving in their verdict, " Sarved her right," depend upon it, he would have been hanged if he had done it with the tongs. I wonder whether he was the man who quarrelled with his spouse about the right way of stirring the fire. They had been separated on this account by mutual consent ; their friends, however, having brought them together again, they began talking, as they sat by their hearth, on the first evening after their recon- ciliation, about the folly of falling out on so small a matter, when the lady said : " Foolish, indeed, my dear, especially as / was right all the time !" ( 279 ) ii A DINNER AT GREENWICH. 10 ME BODY has remarked that there is the greatest difference in the world between dining and getting your dinner. The world is a large place ; suppose we test the saying at some repre- sentative spot. What, for instance, is the central point of measurement to us English people? How do we best express our position anywhere on the globe ? Are not all distances measured from Greenwich ? Does not that town, or some magic spot in that parish, provide the true unit of reckoning, and stand for the starting-post of wanderings and voyages ? Is it not the conventional boss or navel of the world ? Thence the navigator counts his degrees. Thence the chronometer derives the " time." There, also, we may consult the statute yard — inch and foot. There, also, for a month or two, the gourmand finds the ideal dinner. It is the centre of the culinary system. 28o ''Dining'' and '' Getting yonr Dinner!' Whatever it may be in the " world," there is, at Greenwich, the greatest difference between dining and getting your dinner. I am not going to describe that meal at the Ship or Trafalgar. Mr. Ouartermaine would not thank me for a stale version of the result of his elaborate and piquant experience. It must be judged by other powers than the eye or the ear. How can I explain, even to myself, the suc- cession of dishes which lead the gratified but buoyant appetite up to the culminating, characteristic focus of a whitebait dinner ? Can I — though I had the skill of the subtlest analyst — define the combined operation of wines, sauces, and brown bread and butter on the jaded or virgin palate ? Epicures would smile at my attempt, hunger would despise my niceness. I will, therefore, let the delicate subject alone, and ask ■ you merely to digest with me some of the reflections which occur to philosophers like ourselves in con- nection with a dinner at Greenwich. In the first place, I remark that the pre- vailing object of the town is to put the satis- faction of even the humblest appetite in as pleasant a light as possible. Do you wish to luxuriate on copper.^ Walk from the water- The Classification of Dinners. 2S1 side to the park, and listen to the invitations which greet you at every door : — " Tea, sir ; nice tea and a summer-house. Walk in, sir ; private apartment — beautiful view ! The mistresses of these establishments stand at their thresholds, the tea-things are exhibited in the windows. Over-head, hangrinor like the signs of old London at right angles to your path, on the house-fronts — like more modern advertisements — cunning placards offer silently to the eye what the hostesses pour into the ear. The fare is cheap : you may bring your own tea screwed up in a page of the London yotirnal, and combine it with " hot water and a cool garden, at twopence per head." Between this and a dinner at the Ship what room for the imaginative palate to wander ! — what variety of meals ! Some incapable of classification under any title in use between breakfast and supper, others scientifically dis- tinctive. Some men dine flying — "snatch a mouthful " — we suppose, as the travelling post- office does a bag at a small station, full speed ; others, having no occupation, dawdle on slowly, spreading the sensation over as much time and palate as they can. 282 The OiitnibiLS Mans Dirmer. Dinners ! Think of the omnibus man's, who drives fourteen hours a day — Sundays included — and, when all goes right, gets twenty minutes for that meal ; but when all oroes wrong, barely ten. Ten minutes for dinner in a period of fourteen hours ! — the hinge is too weak — the pivot is too small for such machinery to revolve on. He gets down, though, no inconsiderable bulk of meat and potatoes. Give a cabman ten minutes, elbow room, and a leg of mutton, and you will have a fresh illustration of the value of time. Critics in eating have remarked, dispa- ragingly, on the sameness of English dinners, as compared, for instance, with French. Their strictures, however, apply only to the feeding of certain classes, — the entertainments which are given in certain society, where the grand set the pattern and the mean hobble after it. Beyond the stereotyped conventional " dinner," the soups, fish, flesh, fowl, &c., there is perhaps a greater variety of meals consumed under that title in England than in France. There the poor man's meal is made to resemble the rich man's in some degree by a change, if not variety of dishes, say by a little meagre soup. They are also related through the accompanying " wine." There is a common ideal to them both. The Bargees Dinner. 283 Take any promiscuous hundred Frenchmen, and their notions of dinner would show much more uniformity than those of a hundred Eno-hshmen. I was led into this train of thought one day last summer at Greenwich. A friend carried me down there to dine. Where we dined — below, not many yards off — visible from the open window of our room, was a man " getting his dinner" in a coal -barge. His fingers showed black upon the victuals he tore. When he wiped his mouth with his sleeve he partially cleansed the lower part of his face. He was very hot. He drank out of a battered tin can which had been standing in the sun. After that he sighed deeply, and shouldered a sack of coals. Not that he sighed from sorrow, it was from satisfaction ; a rude unspoken grace was offered to the lord of work, who had now satisfied his appetite for a time. He shouldered a sack. My friend suggested cigars on the balcony, and the waiter set out some chairs for us. Now, methought, what a variety of dinners there are between ours and the bargee's. Dinner filled my mind — Greenwich put it into my mouth — so pray forgive a ruminative chat. Dinners : let us see — these are hot and cold ; 284 Hot and Cold Dhinei's. they are always hot on board steamers. I suppose there is necessarily something more grateful to the palate in a hot joint. The food is tasted without an effort. On this account a bad hot dinner is abominable, and thus packet-dinners are most offensive. The reeking heap of greens and the large, boiled, underdone leg of mutton, which are always prominent on these occasions, have an intensity of flavour such as no two other dishes ever combined. The cold dinner has a character which it does not deserve ; being socially despised, it is often served without care. Such, however, is the way of the world. The man who has little but plain sense to recommend him is made the worst of, like cold boiled mutton, without pickles or grace ; he is used, not welcomed, while the sappy joint gathers around it all the care of cookery and support of sauces. Help to the strong; and as for the weak, you may kick him securely — he has got no friends. Second-rate cookshops have a wonderful power of developing greasiness ; every item shines. The very hungry, however, who go there generally need greasy food, I mean physically; fat makes fat and warmth. I confess, though, that on hearing a wise man Moderation . 285 the other day remark how Greenlanders ate blubber to produce " carbon," I could not help saying (to myself, of course, for he was a great medical authority) that they probably ate it because they could not get anything else. I am a great believer, nevertheless, in nature as guide and caterer in eating. She not only provides oil and fat for the inhabitant of the Polar regions, but takes away from him the extreme disgust we should feel at such food. Indeed, I believe that the palate is the truest regulator of our diet. What we like best agrees with us best — in moderation — there is the rub. The glutton suffers in the end often as much as the drunkard, and is often more selfish in his sensuality. But he has himself to blame, not his food. Dainty dishes are sometimes abused, because they tempt us to eat too much. Their daintiness is not their defect. The same bulk of nasty food would disagree with us much more than the same bulk of nice food. Some people, indeed, pro- fess that they don't care what they eat. They are generally mistaken ; but if not, all I can say is, they ought to be ashamed of them- selves. To affect superiority to one of the senses 286 Prof esscd ^Indifference to Flavour . God has given us is questionable, but so to change oneself as to be really insensible is unnatural. Don't care what they eat ! Take an extreme case. There must be something wrong about a man who would munch with uniform indifference a pine-apple or a carrot. Those, however, who profess not to care for delicacies, when it comes to the proof, are often found to mean that they don't care for what other people esteem delicacies, having them- selves a particular appetite for and enjoyment in tasting some vulgar dish — such as sheep's- head and trotters. In fact, their boast gene- rally ends in establishing only the coarseness of their own taste. It would be curious — yes, instructive — to inquire how far epicures help to educate and civilise a people. Man has been defined as a cooking animal. Delicate eating accompanies other refinements. But how far is its cookery the measure of a nation's worth ? I leave my readers to pursue these thoughts, noticing myself one apparently good result from dainty and expensive feeding. Every fruit and vege- table sold at a large price is a reward of skilful scientific gardening. Did no one really care for very early peas, or what not, probably few or none would be grown. Horticulture, as a Indirect Prizes for Gardening. 287 science, would want one of its strongest sup- ports if there were no epicures. Think how much stimulus is given to gardening as well as to cookery by an elaborate and expensive meal. A dinner at so many guineas a-head repre- sents genuine talent and work in several pro- fessions, though it may imply much sensuality in the guests. In forming a fair judgment on the matter we must consider those who produce, quite as much as those who consume. If, as Sydney Smith says, " the object of all government is roast mutton," what the newspapers call *' recherche entertainments " may be closely allied with political philosophy, and the Nation's dinner measure the strength of the Cabinet. There is, no doubt, a waste of supporting power in the cookery of many poor people. I do not refer merely to the material — the meat which is burnt or the gravy which is spilt — but to the small solace and comfort got in propor- tion to the bulk of food which is prepared at last. It is not so nice, and therefore not so nutritious, as it might be. Soyer was one of the greatest of philan- thropists ; but even his shilling book is too elaborate for very uneducated people. The 288 Cookery Books. thousands which have been sold must have cheered many a home ; we want, however, something simpler — best of all, more practical elementary teaching about cookery in con- nection with national schools. If inspectors required less grammar and had an examination in (say) boiling potatoes, it would be a step in the riorht direction, I would have the girls bring up their exer- cises in clean wooden bowls. The children should be allowed only such cooking means as they had at home. In the upper classes there might be prizes for puddings and other portions, cheap though not nasty. Indeed, without some practical knowledge of the art, books on cookery are almost useless, just as the juiciest description of a dinner is thrown away on those unnatural people who do not care what they eat. As an illustration of the influence of cookery, I will mention an anecdote which you may have stumbled on yourself A great eater, famed more for capacity than discernment, bet that he would consume in ten minutes any two shillings' worth of wholesome human food, however combined. His adver- sary took four pots of threepenny ale,' and emptied them into a very large pie-dish, Phases of Dining. 289 then he soaked in it twelve penny rolls, and, presenting the result to the eater, with a spoon, bade him begin. He did so, but could not finish the mess within the wagered limit. Of course there is much more to be said about dinner. Under what forms does dinner appear ! The greedy debauch — the prolonged civic feast — the sudden but complete meal, quite French, that which is provided, say, at Macon, for travellers between Paris and Geneva, or Marseilles, where you find the cork of your bottle of wine ready drawn, and see the last plate or two of soup poured out as the train " arrests itself," and the guard says " Macon," " vingt minutes." Then there is the lunch-dinner, — a delusive compound. The monotonous chop, over which the unimaginative bachelor grins, day after day. The heavy tea— also a mistake. The felon's dinner — rations, sullen hunger, and a scraped pannikin. Some persons object to the smell of cook- ing. That depends. Who does not recollect Dickens's description of the stew-pot at the Jolly Sandboys, in " The Old Curiosity Shop" } How, when the cunning landlord took off the lid, and the savour of the mess filled the room, u 290 Which is best f not a traveller but made up his mind to stop, — altogether dismissing what feeble thought he had about pushing on another mile or two that night. As for the smell of dinner, I say that depends. One man rings the bell violently, and is fierce about the kitchen-door; another sniffs, and is silent. Which is best ? A good appetite, with a bad dinner ; or a bad appetite, with a good dinner ? Don't answer without thinking. There are good sauces besides hunger. A bad dinner is not only unpleasant, but unwholesome. Con- ceive great appetites and bad dinners universal. The blacks in Australia will eat eight or ten pounds of strong kangaroo at one go. There is much to be said in favour of less hunger and better' food. Well ! I suppose there is a medium in the matter, — as the hearsay philo- sopher affirms. At any rate, please don't pretend a contempt for cookery. There is nothing in the world, my good friend, which you could so ill afford to lose. Yo2t do7it care what yoti eat! You deserve to have every spit, range, and pot pass out of creation, and to die of scurvy ! Charity dinners are, though not exclusively. Charity Dinners. 291 yet eminently English. There is the fact of dinner on which to build, around which the floating philanthropy gathers, under which it develops itself. The feeder of the hungry must first be fed himself There is thus the realization of the charity in company with the word " dinner," then the actual influence of the food upon the donor. But I must have done, thouofh I mieht say much more. The subject is endless : every one is more or less a competent critic. I have been too bold to write on such a theme. Courteous reader, in rising from the table, let me express a hope that you see a very great difference between "dining" and "getting your dinner." May you never sit down to one without an appetite, — may you never hunger without being able to dine ! u 2 ( 292 ) WAITERS. HO knows anything about the natural history of waiters ? Present in all lodging-places, with a home in none — moving in the midst of travellers, though never stepping beyond the door of the house in which they live — they form one of the most singfular classes in the modern world. Though, probably, on examination, they would be found human enough, yet at first the idea of a waiter shedding tears, making a will or an offer of marriage, or having a tooth drawn, or, in fact, doing anything but wait, could not get itself admitted without a little hitch or hesitation. Where do they come from } Where do they learn their craft 1 We see volunteers, nay, sometimes militiamen, at drill. Plough- men lead the horses before they drive the plough, artisans pass an apprenticeship, sur- geons walk the hospital, and even the grand gentlemen who sit in Government offices have Their Mode of Life. 293 an examination in spelling before they draw their salaries ; but who ever heard of a school for waiters ? Perhaps they are born full- dressed, with napkins under their arms. Once here, they never seem to hesitate or fail ; and yet their work is arduous, intricate, and inces- sant, requiring not only ready wit, but both dexterity and strength of arm. I have, how- ever, often noticed that in advertisements they describe themselves as single-handed, as if a watchman were to beg particular attention to the fact of his having only one eye. Excluded by professional engagements from the use of conventional meal-times, do waiters sit down to their dinner, or shoot it flying .'* Where do they sleep, oil their hair, and put on their shirt-fronts ? Have they any guilds, lodges, or other brotherly associations and meetings ? What are their amusements ? A countryman once thought he had found them at their winter play : he noticed a set of men in tail-coats and white ties scudding round a patch of ice on the Serpentine, about the size of a coffee room, but it turned out to be the Skating Club. Some little time ago I had a good oppor- tunity of observing the movements of a waiter kept in a seaport town. We were in no hurry, and so we stopped there till the rain was over. 294 Turned back. There was, as tourists say, nothing to see. The inn, which was also a station and a custom-house, had a railway terminus at the front, and a packet -wharf at the back door. The land view consisted of saltings ; the sea view, of a muddy tidal harbour — both backed by bare bleak downs. We arrived late at night, intending to sail the next morning ; but it blew and rained, and then did both together so viciously, that we gave it up, and spent a wet day at the station. Before, however, we settled to stop, we went on board the steamer, moved our luggage, took berths, and made up our minds to bear the usual inconveniences of a rough passage across the channel in a long narrow boat, which heaved as if it were breathing, even in the sheltered harbour. But the wind still rose, and so we all returned to the hotel. It was during the mental parenthesis which followed, on being suddenly prostrated and set to begin a new bill at the inn from which we had just cleared out, that I gave my mind to the waiter. One could not keep up an interest all day in the zigzag jerky course of fat rain- drops down the window. Some of our fellow- passengers smoked, some ate incessantly ; a group of wet Frenchmen sat apart, limp and A double Days Work. 295 moody, like barn-door fowls in a shower; some of the party went to sleep. Not so the waiter — for there was but one. A double day's work had come upon him. The last wave of travellers had been thrown back, and met the tide from town, until it filled the house. Having nothing to do, they all wanted some- thing " to take," immediately. Idleness is the hardest work in the world ; the idle man never knows what it is to rest, and so must be fed. Accordingly, when, a number of them get together and help one another, they necessarily consume a vast amount of victual. But, as I have said, our waiter multiplied himself, and met all demands. Waiting is a gift, and exhibits some most remarkable combinations of mental power. It is not enough to say that a waiter has to recollect the different orders he receives, and execute them at once ; this does not do him justice. On the Continent, his task is much facilitated by the table-d'hote, for in England our insular dissociable habits make a waiter's post a hundredfold more hard. You are not conducted to the same spot at the dinner-table day after day ; you do not dine at a fixed hour, but sit down when and where you like. The waiter must bear in mind the number of your room, and connect that with 296 Permtitations and Combinations. the various items of your capricious and par- ticular meals. There were a good many people in our inn ; the number of our room was 29, and that was on the first floor. The second was also full. Here were a set of new faces to be learned only for one night. Each tenant had, say, three meals — dinner, tea, breakfast. Now, considering that the minute details of all these had to be remembered, chops to be associated with A, soup with B, sherry- and-water with this man, soda-and-brandy with that, bottled stout or draught ale with a third — all being of various prices ; considering, too, that the stream of permutations and com- binations of customers went on for hours, and that all had to be presented with so many bills, without entanglement or substitution, at the same moment, the next morning, under the trying pressure of a steamer's departure, and the arrival of a fresh trainful of passengers, merely passing through the house, but calling for goes of this, that, or the other, at the bar as they hurried by — biscuits, cigars, with " I've no small change," " I've nothing but French money," &c., while the amount was being made out — considering all this, I say it required an eye and memory of no common power to perform the duties of a waiter. Oitly a Waiter! 297 Besides being; able to fix and arranofe a crowd of facts in his mind, the waiter must be able to dismiss them at once ; to sponge the slate of his memory, and begin to cover it again immediately with details, whose very similarity is the most dangerous and perplexing part of the business — and this, day after day, week after week. With all these duties, the waiter must not stop to think. With a head full of orders on the point of being discharged, he must submit to be called back for a spoon, or to say where the coat with an umbrella strapped to it, not the shawl with the parasol, was put, when No. 17 came back from the boat, and changed his room to No. '^']. Only a waiter ! Why, no prime minister in his place, in presence of a jealous minority, can need greater promptness, accuracy, and elasticity of mind. The waiter, indeed, answers at a disadvantage ; he has no notice of questions, but is expected to be always at his post, ready with a reply, in a house where Government business, as well as that of private members, is being conducted through con- tinuous sittings, morning, noon, and night, for the whole period of his holding office. Indeed, a waiter must not only have his wits about him, but wits of a remarkable order. Unlike 298 A Bar of his Own. many earning less than he, he cannot see his work grow under his hand ; he cannot hope to perform it mechanically, like a man laying bricks or rowing a boat; he is always begin- ning intercourse with strangers. See how grateful he evidently is for kind, considerate treatment ! Who would not relieve the anxious monotony of his work with a pleasant word ? Who would grudge him the small gratuity, so that he may at last settle down in some business, in which he is not only the jaded medium between the producer and consumer, but a sharer in the main profits along with the trim chamber-maid ? Let us hope they may save enough, ere long, to club their fortunes, and to possess, though it be a humble one, a bar of their own. ( 299 ) LONDON SCHOOL TREATS. iHE Annual Treat has now become quite an educational institution. The day is prized in the future and in retrospect. The children, with a de- licious rejection of all responsibility, magnify the arduousness and specialities of the excur- sion as the day approaches, and when it has passed recount their extravagance and feats with slowly-fading interest throughout the remainder of the summer. The anxious manager, too, thinks quite as much of the business as the most heedless little trot ; he dreads the coming possibilities of accident, and no one walks off with more relief than he when the day is over, and the twenty van-loads of scatterbrained children have been safely emptied into the street by the school, without fracture or loss. It may seem an easy thing, with all the appliances of London, to take from 500 to 1,000 children for a day Into the country; but you must not forget that there can be no 300 A7i Accuinulatio7i of Pleasm^e. rehearsal of the proceedings, no preparatory march out, no previous drill. The strong influ- ence which accompanies the present educational system is nowhere more shown than in the power of ordinary every-day discipline to control the child regiment on its one unpractised field-day. True, there are accidents, not unfrequently, but the marvel is there are not more. The exu- berance of the children's pleasure comes from the consciousness not only of a holiday, but a holiday as a school, all together, in the country. It is the very nick and crisis of the summer's joy. All provokes amusement. The master smiles, the teachers play. The monitors romp. What wonder that Tommy sprains his ankle among the hundreds thus suddenly plunged into the very opposite of their daily life ? The way in which children delight in run- ning risks is occasionally even absurd, however provoking. Some years ago, I gave about 400 children an excursion to Ealing. We were to play and feast In a big hay-field safely hedged, and studded with large shadow- casting trees. We went in vans, and drove into the meadow at once — so as not to run the risk of losing children by unloading on the common. There were several animals being taken out of the field as we drove in. / never had such a day. 301 Well, the first thing that the first boy did who got off the foremost van, was to pull the tail of the nearest horse. Of course he was kicked down, but, having happened to single out a rheumatic old mare, and having run right upon her hocks, he was simply laid on his back, without being hurt. He could hardly, how- ever, have made speedier arrangements for a serious accident. Sometimes children who have been used to back streets and alleys all their lives, are quite bewildered with their first excursion, and cannot get fairly to play for some time. I remember once takino- a num- ber of such poor inexperienced little boys to Hampton Court. It was too much for many of them. A few were stupefied, others ran wild. I never had such a day. The children were mostly strange to me, but I directed the entertainment as the criver of it. Had I not marked each boy with a red calico rosette, I should have lost ever so many among the other schools which were there. We got off very well on the whole, but I was horrified once at finding one fry of urchins bathing in an ornamental basin among the gold fish. Another unintentionally killed a duck with a horse-chestnut, which hit him on the back of the head, etc., etc. However, they were very 302 Popular Treats. merry, poor little fellows, and the affair of the duck happily came to nothing. I suppose the guardians considered it accidental death, which it really was. I should remark, in passing, that the performances of that day were quite excep- tional, for, having assisted at or superintended many school treats, I must bear witness to the remarkably good behaviour and obedience of the children in our National Schools at their annual excursions. But let me say a word about the kind of treat which is most liked. It should not be too stiff nor instructive. There should be plenty of running about : a processional ex- cursion loses half its relish. The best place is a large field, with plenty of grass, shade, and liberty within certain boundaries. The commander-in-chief, knowing that children will spend money, should be careful to make an arrangement with the pedlars and donkey boys, who always scent out a school excursion, and present themselves on the ground directly the children come — in most cases fleecing- them at once. There should be a regular tariff of prices, or children will pay anything in the first demand for a ride or a swing. It is well, too, to provide a choice of goods and amuse- ments. This divides and protects the children. Donkeys. 303 For several years I have arranged beforehand for the presence of donkeys, swings, knock'em- downs, print-sellers, archery, &c., at a certain price. A photographic tent, too, with like- nesses at fourpence a-head, frames included, is very popular. Any one taking a large school out of London would find this much appre- ciated. It is better than fruit. There is some- thinof to show, and no stomach-ache involved in it. There are itinerant artists who are glad of the chance. At any rate, let there be something cheap and wholesome which the children can buy, and, whatever is omitted, be sure you get some donkeys. A penny a ride is generally the price, but the men will often neutralize the arrangement, unless you settle how long the " ride " is to be. I always take a policeman with me, and bargain with the owner of the donkeys before him and the children. " From this tree to the corner of the field, and back, for a penny." " Very well, sir," says the master of the obstinate stud. The children all catch the price, screaming in chorus, " The corner of the field and back for a penny." The next moment they secure every donkey, and set off with more enthusiasm than the steeds they bestride. I have known quite 304 The Choice of a Place. expensive excursions comparatively fail for lack of donkeys. Swings, too, are invaluable ; if you really wish the children to enjoy them- selves, you should have several of them. A solitary swing is a centre of strife. There should be a small one for the little chifdren alone. There is a considerable choice of places to go to in the neighbourhood of London. The great thing is to have it as countryfied as possible, and yet with available shelter. This last can often be provided by a rick-cloth, which is much cheaper than a tent, and will cover a host of children. If you can get a good field, with a rick-cloth, donkeys, swings, and other attractions of the sort, ordered for the occasion, you can generally combine all the charms of the so-called " tea-garden " without its attendant drawbacks. The Crystal Palace is too stiff for downright play. Many pleasure-grounds are too ill-conducted. A field with extemporized shelter, and selected camp-followers, is the thing. But suppose you have fixed upon the place, and have not decided how to go there, take my advice and get vans. They consume a long time on the journey, which is half the fun ; they carry the children from the door of the school where How to get there. 305 they assemble, right into the field where they play. They are ready to go or return at your own hour. Any railway, on the contrary, involves four marches — one to the station in the morning, then one to the field ; another back" to the station, when the day's play is over, and, worst of all, another from the station home, perhaps through crowded streets at night. There are too many musterings, and the journey itself is much too short. It is over directly, whereas a drive in vans of some only six miles is quite a long business. Choose a flat road if you employ vans, or the price of them will be much increased. You ought to get twenty vans for a guinea a piece for a day, supposing you go only six or seven miles out of town. Any gratuity to the drivers should be made to depend upon their behaviour, for they are a thirsty race. It is not a bad plan to give them all tea after the children ; it keeps them together, and weakens their excuse for drinking at the nearest public- house. They always take it as a kindness, and it costs very little. A word about the packing of vans. The children should be made into companies of from thirty to forty, according to their size. It is advisable to put those who know each X 3o6 Provisions. other best together ; which Is done by making the companies out of the contiguous school- classes. Each company should have a number known to the children and the driver of their van. Thus, when the day's amusement is over, and the horses are standing harnessed ready to return, there ought to be no confusion. The master, having assembled the children, says, " Now then. No. i." Up drives No. i, and those who belong to No. i company get in : thus the whole are soon seated ; all rush and scramblinor is avoided. There oueht to be two teachers or seniors with each van, and a policeman on the last. Now about provisions. If your funds are limited, don't attempt a dinner. Let the children brinor some with them. Give them a hearty tea between three and four o'clock, and a bun a piece, with milk-and-water at last. I have known schools where everything was provided free, except dinner, and that the children paid some trifle for. The consequence was, that the excursion ceased to be a " treat," and the parents, if not the children, grumbled at any failure or omission, as unjust. There are three ways to cater on these occasions : — ist. You can carry everything with you, and make your own tea. 2nd. You can Minor Treats. 307 find some respectable innkeeper near your field to prepare for you. 3rd. You can get the whole thing done by a contractor from town. There are persons who would provide for an excursion of thousands at a few days' notice, and at almost any scale of prices you choose. This saves a vast deal of trouble. The country landlord is seldom experienced in the sort of thing you want ; your own commis- sariat is liable to break down. You forget the knives, the butter, the sugar, or some item which affects the success of the whole affair. A contractor is the best. You can calculate the cost to a penny, and be quite easy about having what you want. There is a subsidiary treat which many schools within a decent walk of Kensington Gardens might get up, which is very successful and cheap. The most retired part of the gardens are sure to be new to the children. You hardly ever see anybody there. I have witnessed several famous extemporized treats, by taking the whole school to a pleasant open spot among the trees to the north of the round pond. If you speak to a park-keeper he will see that no undesirable people come to interfere with your play. This excursion, too, teaches people to make use of the fresh air and quiet X 2 3o8 Infants Treats. within their reach. The present retirement of some part of the gardens, off the great lines of thoroughfare, is most remarkable. I sat on a bench there one day, for half an hour, without seeing a soul except at a distance, and then I left without being interrupted. Birds Avere sinorinor in the trees, two or three orardeners belonging to the palace were potting some plants, about fifty yards off, and the only sign of London, beyond the faint hum of distant traffic, was a stray policeman ; but he was smoking a pipe. I always pity the children of the infant school on the day of the annual excursion. You must draw the line somewhere. You can't take them. We always have a little appendix or postscript of a "treat" for these, about a week after the great affair. It really can consist of nothing but tea, and play in the schoolroom ; but a few shillings' worth of penny German toys are of priceless value. Imagination does a good deal to give the whole thing a festive character; the chief gratification, however, consists of unlimited noise, and romping in rooms where they are at other times taught to behave quietly. The character of a school is more affected than many people think by its treats. Those Here they are! 309 who see the train of vans, full of children, setting out some bright midsummer day, or hear the chorus of little voices as they come cheering back at night, sometimes little suspect the anxiety and enjoyment involved in that one day's excursion. It is the main theme of some back dingy streets where hundreds watch the weather with kind interest, and quite a crowd awaits the return of the cavalcade. " Here they are ! " is the cry, as the first van comes round the corner, and the children are soon claimed by parents, and fast asleep, dreaming of the real buttercups and daisies of the clean country meadow where they have spent at least a day, clear of the smoky, dirty town. ( 3IO ) HEDGE-POPPING. UNDERSTAND by the above heading the small sport of those who are fond of shooting, but own no preserves, and take out no licence. They are by no means poachers, but follow up a blackbird with an interest unmarred by envy of the great guns ; not but that they sometimes — in the sudden heat of discovery — kill a par- tridge, pheasant, or a hare, but, as a rule, they do not affect such game, but aim at small results, which they pursue with spirits and success worthy of a tiger-hunt. All birds are fair game to them, with the exception of robins, which are sacred, and rooks, which enjoy a special privilege of destruction, and may not be killed, except young. I am not sure whether a true hedge-popper would kill a wren ; I hardly think he would. Possibly her supposed relationship to cock-robin is a pro- tection to this little bird. Nor would he harm an owl or a swallow. But, with these exceptions, Its Recommendations. 311 the hedge-popper lets fly at anything within his reach. And why should he be refused a chronicler ? Battues are reported in the Tifiies ; the accounts of the moors are published with a business-like money-article sort of air, some weeks before the 12th of August; the judges who go our circuits, and the magistrates who remain at home, are continually engaged in adjudicating between poachers and sportsmen ; half the conversation at the squire's table is about game ; the Houses of Parliament are agi- tated by proposals for the conviction of men who may be suspected of having pheasants in their pockets ; the governors and the governed are equally bitter and complaining about preserves. Why, then, should the humble hedge-popper, who is happier in his " sport " than the largest game-owner in the country, be unnoticed .'* He is content to enjoy himself without pro- tection ; he needs no keepers to set up at night and have their skulls cracked ; he asks for no army of beaters and markers ; he needs no expensive outfit ; he does not buy dogs at fifty guineas the brace ; he is not plagued with a kennel, abused by tenants, nor covered with obloquy by the Radical journals. And yet he can perfect himself in all that distinguishes a true sportsman. He can shoot well — at least he 312 The first Bird. ought to do so, for he is sharply tested by the specialties and variety of his sport ; he must learn to be patient ; he sees and should remember the habits of birds ; he finds abundant exercise in the pursuit of his amuse- ment, and wastes no money on its artificial support. Who does not remember the first bird he shot ? I do : it was a tomtit on an apple- tree. One afternoon, when I was a naughty little chit in a pinafore, I got possession of a horse-pistol which had been hanging up over the kitchen mantelshelf till it was as rusty as an old rat-trap. After some experimental flashes in the pan, I loaded it, feeling rather guilty and doubtful, with a handful of pease ; and seeing cook safely occupied with her own con- cerns, sallied forth. Then a naughty thought suddenly came into my head. Should I shoot the cat ? the temptation was almost irresistible; she sat on a low wall, with her eyes shut, licking the sunshine off her paws. Would it hurt her ? Probably. She was a yard off. Would it make much noise ? I should think so, cat and all. Would she recover, and tell cook .'^ What should I do with the body, if immediately successful ? It was too rash a venture, all things considered ; but to this^day Now, then. 313 she has no idea what a narrow shave it was. I passed on : there was a small apple-tree close by, and a tomtit fidgeting about among its upper twigs. Now, then. With the pistol held in my two hands, both arms extended, head thrown back, and teeth shut, I made a demonstration which at least ouofht to have arrested his attention. Not a bit — he fussed on. Thrice did I cover him with my piece ; as often did it miss fire ; but the fourth time Whether it was from the noise or the pease, or both, is uncertain, but he died. Pussy reached the kitchen-door with a spang ; cook rushed out ; and I, flinging down the pistol, which smoked like a squib, and clutch- ing my prey, scampered off to a particular lair of my own in the shrubbery, where I might let the first gush of success relieve itself without interruption. That exploit is one of the clearest in my memory, and is, I believe, as deeply cut in the virgin surface of that material, as many a capital-lettered crisis of my being. How confused a record we have of those years when life's waggon got on the dusty level road, when one day was like another, as we toiled on with tedious speed! A man's memory becomes at last like a long travelled letter. 314 Let me look kindly back. thick with blotted impress, struck hastily on, as he passed from post to post, covered with confused significance. Whereas of the palmy- days of youth But, heigho ! Let us to hedge-popping. I believe that most famous " shots " have been hedge-poppers in their time, and, more- over, that some of their pleasantest remi- niscences are of early days, when society did not notice their pretensions. Let me try and touch, if it may be, the memories of some bygone days in the respectable bosoms of elderly gentlemen who read these words. I am grey now, and have grave work enough to do, but when I see a boy creeping along under a hedge, with his gun and ears full-cock, I think of the time when my waist was less than it is, and I tore holes in my jacket, stalk- ing the smallest game. Let me look kindly back, and where I see a scene or phase of hedge-popping, put it down here in harmless words. The young hedge-popper begins almost in- variably in the snow or among the gooseberry- bushes. A small boy frequents these bushes when the fruit is ripe, creeping about and looking beneath the low branches, with, of course, far more ease than a man ; and there The Hedge-popper s first Weapon. 315 he sees prodigious opportunities of sport. There are great blackbirds hopping about and pecking away, bill-deep, in the central stores of fruit ; missel thrushes, showing to the boy- eye as big as partridges ; and young robins, which have all the impudence of their race, but are not protected by the badge of red upon their breasts — mean-looking, thievish, voiceless birds, which the hedge-popper does not consider to be robins as yet. On these the young sportsman generally begins, being encouraged by the gardener. His first weapon is a bow and arrow, probably a crossbow made with the aid of the village carpenter. The missile is a heavy bolt, which will fly some thirty yards, and does duty over and over again till it is lost. Armed with this, the boy squats or peeps among the fruit-bushes till he gets a shot at very short range, say three yards. Mostly, the bolt flies wide, causing by its own flight and recovery far more destruction of fruit than any one small bird ; occasionally, however, the game is struck and slain, and great is the triumph. Happily, there is less pain and fright suffered by the victim in this than in any other sport. The bird generally hops off, and continues its meal at the next bush, but when struck, receives a fatal blow : once 3i6 Progj'ess. hit with a missile bigger and heavier than itself, it comes to grief suddenly. But the hedge-popper soon gets beyond the bow and arrow. I remember, when a little lad, thinking another supremely blessed in the pos- session of a pistol-barrel mounted on a little gunstock, and which once killed a yellow-ham- mer at the almost incredible distance of twenty- two paces. I had a pistol myself — to this day, I wonder why it was not taken from me — and used to make some very fair practice at eight or ten yards. But at last we got a gun, and rose towards the higher walks of hedge-popping. Not that the gun was any great matter to shoot, but still it was a gun. You could put it to your shoulder, and take aim. It kicked, which was a great point, and made a prodigious noise. We bought paper screws of shot at the little grocer's in the village, or we cut up sheet-lead into mince-meat with our pocket-knives, and loaded the weapon with that. Of course, we used the bowl of a tobacco-pipe to measure the charge, and employed paper for wad- ding. With this implement, we aimed high and low, shot blackbirds thirty yards off, cut up the shrubs, and broke cucumber-lights and hitiden The yackdaws Tree. 317 garden-glasses. There were, however, two places which almost invariably afforded some sport — one was a tree at the corner of a barn, where the sparrows always retired when dis- turbed in the farmyard, from whence they made their raids. Every one living in the country knows some such tree, generally a thorn, thick with tangled twigs, and altogether impervious to the eye when covered with leaves. Well, during the winter, there were always some sparrows or finches to be found there, despite of our constant popping. You might stand beneath it the whole afternoon, and find a succession of shots. But the chief tree was a high elm frequented by jackdaws. These birds were pronounced mischievous ; and though charged to hold rooks sacred, we were permitted to shoot jackdaws, if we could : not such an easy matter for little boys, who had to get within thirty yards of these birds, and then catch them sitting. They combine, like many busy, chattering people, much cunning with their impudence, and scent a gun as quickly as a thief does a policeman. There was a long wall, however, to our garden, near the end of which stood the jackdaws' tree. When we saw two or three of them fairly perched, we used — hiding the gun — to slip 3 1 8 Sam. under cover of the wall at some distance off, in an unembarrassed sort of way, as if we were going to gather fruit; then, stooping down, we would creep quickly up behind it till we reached a large lilac opposite the elm-tree. Peeping out of the thick of this over the wall^ we too often found that we were detected, and that the birds had flown. If not, if the familiar " jackle, jackle, jackle " was still heard, then resting the piece in the ivy on the wall- top, and taking a long poking aim, one of the rogues was pretty sure to bite the dust. I often think of that masked battery now, when I smell lilac. Of course, those were days in which we could not shoot flying, and a jackdaw was a golden eagle. We had a man-servant then, named Sam. I remember once his making us boys very jealous by killing two daws at one shot out of this same bush. They had grown very shy, but he got them early one summer morning, and broupfht them to our room before we were up. We thought it a prodigious feat. Sam was a Weller in his way; and though he occa- sionally anticipated us in some opportune shot, used to prefer helping us in hedge-popping to doing his work. But he always had an excuse for any failure. I remember his proposing to Catching a Cold. 319 catch a rabbit with a fat house-dog we had ; and on returning unsuccessful, " The rabbit," he said, " ran so fast, that Mungo had hard work to keep behind him." Poor Sam ! I forget what became of him ; he got into great scrapes with the authorities for incurable lazi- ness and impertinence ; but he was an enthu- siastic assistant in hedge-popping. He never did anything without some expression of comic interest in the work. I remember once look- ing into the kitchen, and seeing Sam crouched up by the fire, his hands on his knees, mouth open, eyes half shut, and face as long as a fiddle-case. The gardener coming in at that instant, cried out, — " Hollo, Sam, what are you after } " "Hush!" replied Sam, cautiously, "I'm catching a cold ; " as if it were an animal behind the grate, which he expected to bolt, like a rabbit. The shrubs at the end of the wall where the battery was masked for the jackdaws, formed an excellent practice-ground for snap-shooting In later boy years. There were always some blackbirds or thrushes in the shrubbery ; but when disturbed, they never broke cover till they got to the wall, and then they popped over with a flip, and I can tell you it is no 320 Snapshooting. such easy matter to catch a bird thus. Some of your pheasant-butchers would be hard put to it to knock over a blackbird in such a glimpse, but we got to be rather dabs at this quick shooting ; and on the first occasion of my ever shooting at a woodcock, at my first battue, I knocked one down which was twisting about among the trees, in the presence of some eight or nine old sportsmen, with very great applause. Woodpigeons are among the hedge-popper's head game. The best way to get them is to wait by the plantations to which they resort, and stand still till they come. But by no means shoot at one as it approaches you — the feathers of these birds are so thick upon the breast that they will often turn off the shot ; wait till they have passed, and then they are vulnerable enough. The same rule applies to wild duck, gulls, &c. Though wild-duck shooting is a high and separate art, yet the popper is in his glory on the beach, and about the saltings on the flat coast. Nowhere does he learn better to calculate distances, nowhere has he greater variety of practice, from the curlew going at full speed down a creek, to an oxbird running and then rising up just within range, and ''Oh, Billy ! what have you done?'' 321 needing to be knocked down in an instant, if touched at all. There is something, though, about shooting gulls against the grain. They are the marked companions of our sacred friends the rooks. With them they follow the plough, . and dot the dark mould with spots of white, showing bigger than they really are by their contrast with their black companions. But the worst feat of all is to shoot an owl : there is something ominous of evil in it. Did you ever see a wounded owl ? Its look of melancholy reproach is most affecting. One does not wonder at the boy in the story, whose companion had winged an owl in a churchyard, and who ran to pick it up. " Oh, Billy," he cried out when he reached it, " what have you done ? You've been and shot a cherubim ;" a great compliment to the sculptor of the tombstones he had studied. There is one rule, too, the hedge-popper will keep sacredly — he will never shoot in the breedinor-times. Autumn and winter are his seasons, especially the latter, when the black- birds are dispersed in the hedges, and the larks are not packed by too cold weather. Then even an old sportsman may find abund- ant occasions for exercise and skill, without 32 2 Refiections. breeding any of the bad blood which too often accompanies the preservation of game, and without slaughtering the numerous little birds which preserve our fields and gardens from the grub. In revising this little paper, written some time ago, I cannot help feeling how gentle we London parsons should be with the wilder spirits among our street boys, who, too often, have apparently no vent but mischief for letting off their steam. Half the harm they do comes from sheer energy, which wants only to be guided into useful channels. All honour to the Founders of the Shoe Brigade ! Did you ever employ one (not a founder) ? The sensation is curious. He pounces on your foot, brushing your trowsers and scratching off the bigger splashes with his nails. It is like putting your toe in the way of a quarrelsome house-terrier, which makes in- effectual attempts to worry the intruder. But Blacky does his work well, though always in a desperate hurry. THE STAMP OFFICE. ELL, I am going down the Strand, so I will just run in and get it done at once." So said I innocently of a small square of parchment which came some weeks ago by the Yorkshire post, with a request from my friend C that I would get it stamped for him at Somerset House, and leave it with Messrs. Stickfast & Grabfee, the clerical lawyers in Bishop Street. It was the nomination to the incumbency of a poor district in the North, miscalled a " living " by some, but well known to others, with apt reference to the permanent labour and poverty of the place, as a " per- petual curacy." I folded it up in an envelope, and took it at three o'clock that afternoon to Somerset House. Having inquired of an omniscient policeman where stamps were to be obtained, I was guided to a doorway with "Inland Revenue" over it. Passing through this, and turning sharp to the left, I found Y 2 324 "A^-, PKIKIEBS, GKEAI QUEEN SIBEEIj LONDON, W.C. l PLEA^t DO NOT REMOVE THIS BOOK CARD -5^^1LIBRARYQ^ University Research Library Xi (JO TO ALL LOVERS OF OUR BRITISH WILD FLOWERS. In Monthly Numbers, at 5s. each. SOWEEBY'S ENGLISH BOTANY : CONTAINING Descriptions and Drawings of every British Wad Flower, Life Si and coloured to Nature by Hand-Painting. Scientific Editor— J. T. BOSWELL SYME, F.L.S. Popular Editor— MRS, LANKESTER. VOLUME I. Contains all the Rues, Anemones, Crowfoots, Spearworts, Waterlilies, Poppies, Fumitories, Mustards, Rockets, Stocks, Lady's Smocks, Cresses, and other Plants ranked under the Natural Orders Ranunculace.^ to Crucifer.e. Seven Paris at bs. each. Complete in cloth, price, 38«. ; in half-mo- rocco, 42s. ; in whole morocco, 48s. Gd. VOLUME II. Contains all the Mignonettes, Rockroses, Pansies, Sundews, Milkworts, Pinks, Catchflies, Campions, Cbickweeds, Stitchworts, Sandworts, Pearlworts, Spurreys, Waterworts, St. John's Worts, Mallows, Flaxes, Crane's Bills, Geraniums, and other Plants ranked under the Natural Orders Resedace.e to Rhamnace^. Seven Parts at bs. Complete in cloth, .^8s. ; in half morocco, 42s. ; in whole morocco, 48*. 6rf. VOLUME III. (^Ready August 1st, 1864) will contain all the Furzes, Brooms, Rest- harrows, Vetches, Lucernes, Medocks, Melilots, Trefoils, Clovers, Wild Plums, Cherries, Apples, Pears, Strawberries, Cinquefoils, Brambles, Wild Roses, and other Plants ranked under the Natural Orders Legu- MINIFER.E to RoSACE.E. Seven Parts at 5s. Complete in cloth, 38*.; in half-morocco, 42s. ; in whole morocco, 48s. 6d. The Athenatum, in a critical and highly favourable review, says : — " Mr. Syme's ' English Botany ' will be the most complete Flora of Great Bril ain ever brought out. This great Work will find a place where- ever botanical science is cultivated, and the study of our native plants with all their fascinating associations held dear." The Work commenced in January, 1863, and has appeared regularly. As all the Parts are kept in print Subscribers can commence taking the Work whenever they like. Anybody desirous of seeing the Work can do so by application to the Publisher, or the Publisher will afford facilities for Booksellers to show it to their customers. LONDON : ROBERT HARDWICKE, 192, PICCADILLY, W. USEFUL WOllKS, The Grasses of Great Britain (Completion of). Now ready, in 1 vol., containing life-size, full-coloured Drawings, with magnified Organs, of 144 British Grasses, and Observations on their Natural History and Uses. Described by C. P. JOHNSON. Illustrated by J. E. SOWERBY. Royal 8vo., price .^1. 14s. Parts XIV. to XXXI. may still be had. The Useful Plants of Great Britain. A Treatise upon the principal Native Vegetables capable of Application as Food or Medicine, or in the Arts and Manufactures. By C. P. JOHNSON. Illus- trated by J. E. SOWERBY. 300 coloured Illustrations. Complete, in cloth, price ^1. 7s, The British Ferns (a Plain and Easy Account of) : together with their Classification, Arrangement of Genera, Structure, and Functions, Directions for Out-door and In-door Culti- vation, &c. By Mrs. LANKESTER. Fully illustrated, price 45., coloured by hand ; 2s. 6d. plain. " Not only plain and easy, but elegantly illustrated." — Athenaum. The British Fungi (a Plain and Easy Account of) : with especial reference to the Esculent and other Economic Species. By M. C. COOKE. With coloured plates of 40 Species. Fcap. 8vo., price 6s. "The book is a very useful one, supplying, for a few shillings, information not hitherto attainable except at a much larger cost." — Field. A Manual of Botanic Terms. By M. C. COOKE. With more than 300 Illustrations. Fcap. 8vo., cloth, price 2s. 6d. "This elegant little volume will be a welcome boon to all botanical students. It contains intelligible descriptions of all the terms used in botanical science, with a collection of beautifully-executed illustrations at the end of the volume. To all who do not but are willing to know the full value of such terms as Campylosperraous, Sterigmate, and Perichcetium, this volume may be safely recommended." — Critic. A Manual of Structural Botany. By M. C. COOKE, Author of "Seven Sisters of Sleep," &c. Illustrated by more than 200 woodcuts. Price Is. ; bound Is. 6d. " Condensed yet clear, comprehensive but brief, it affords to the learner a distinct view." — Globs. Wild Flowers worth Notice : a Selection from the British Flora of some of our Native Plants which are most attractive for their Beauty, Uses, or Associations. By Mrs. LANKESTER. Illustrated by J. E. SOWERBY. Fcap. 8vo., cloth, coloured by hand, 4s.; plain, 2s. 6d. " We are so frequently asked by our country friends to recommend books on Flowers and Ferns that shall be interesting without being too scientific, that we are heartily glad to have the opportunity of so doing which the present elegant but cheap little volume affords." — Practical Farmers' Chronicle. Useful Works prthlished hy Robert Harchcicle. The Fern Collector's Album: a Descriptive Folio for the reception of Natural Specimens ; containing, on the right-hand page, a description of each Fern printed in colours, the opposite page being left blank, for the collector to affix the dried specimen, forming, when filled, an elegant and complete collection of this interesting family of plants. Size of the .Small Edition, 111 by 8J in. ; Large Edition, 1/4 by 11 in. Hand- somely bound, price One Guinea. A Large Edition, without descriptive letter- press, One Guinea. Old Bones; or, Notes for Young- Naturalists. By the Rev. W. S. SYMONDS, Rector of Pendock, Author of " Stones of the Valley," &c. Second Edition, much improved and enlarged. Fcap. 8vo., price 2a. 6d, Fully illustrated. Half-hours with the Microscope. Bv EDWIN LANKESTER, M.D. Illustrated by 250 Drawings from Nature, by TUFFEN WEST. New Edition, much enlarged, with full Description of the various parts of the Instrument. Price 2s. 6d. plain ; 4s. coloured. Half-an.hour on Structure. 1 Half-an-hour at the Pond-side. Half-an-hour in the Garden. Half-an-hour at the Sea-side. Half-an-hour in the Country. | Half-an-hour In-doors. Appendix. — The Preparation and Mounting of Objects. The Mounting and Preparation of Microscopic Objects. By THOMAS DAVIES. Fcap. 8vo., price 2s. 6d. This Manual comprises all the most approved methods of mounting, together with the results of the Author's experience, and that of many of his Friends, in every department of Microscopic Manipulation, and as it is intended to assist the beginner as well as the advanced student, the very rudiments of the art have not been omitted. Chap. I. „ 11. Apparatus. To prepare and mount objects dry. Mounting in Canada Balsam. Preservative Liquids, &c. Chap. V. Sections, and how to cut them, with some re- marks on Dissection. ,, VI. Injection. ,, VII. Miscellaneous. Index. Hints on the Formation of Local Museums. By the Treasurer of the Wimbledon Museum Committee, illustrated. 18mo. price Is. Waste Products and Undeveloped Substances ; or. Hints for Enterprise in Neglected Fields. By P. L. SIMMONDS, Author of " Products of the Vegetable Kingdom," &c. Fcap. 8vo. cloth, price 6s. Metamorphoses of Man and of Animals. Describing the changes which Mammals, Batrachians, Insects, Myriapods, Crus- tacea, Annelids, and Zoophytes undergo whilst in the egg; also the series of Metamorphoses which these beings are subject to in after life. Alternate Gene- ration, Parthenogenesis and General Reproduction treated in extenso. With Notes giving references to the works of Naturalists who have written upon the subject. By A. de QUATREFAGES, Membre de I'Institut (Academic des Sciences), Professeur au Museum d'Histoire Naturelle. Translated by HENRY LAWSON, M.D., Professor of Physiology in Queen's College, Birmingham. 4 Useful M^orks puhlished hy Robert Hardicicke. Prof. Huxley's Lectures "On the Orig-in of Species." 1. The Present Condition of Organic Nature. — 2. The Past Condition.— 3. The method by which the Causes of the Present and Past Conditions of Organic Nature are to be discovered. The Origination of Living Beings. — 4. The Per- petuation of Living Beings, Hereditary Transmission, and Variation.— 5. The Condition of Existence as affecting the Perpetuation of Living Beings. — 6. A Critical Examination of the Position of Mr. Darwin's Work " On the Origin of Species," in relation to the complete Theory of the Causes of the Phenomena of Organic Nature. Cronn 8vo., price 23. 6d. PUBLICATIO NS OF THE RA Y SOCIETY. BRITISH ENTOMOSTRACOUS CRUSTACEA.— A Monograph, with 36 plates (most of them coloured), of all the species of the. By Dr. Baird, F.L.S. 8vo. pp. 364. sSl. Is. BRITISH ANGIOCARPOUS LICHENS. A Monograph of the. With 30 coloured plates. By the Rev. W. A. Leighton, M.A. 8vo. pp. 100. 10s. 6d. CIRRIPEDIA. A Monograph of the family. By C. Dakwin, Esq., M.A., F.R.S, Svo. Vol. I. pp. 400, 10 plates, l6s. Vol. II. pp. 684, 30 plates, ^'1. (js. BRITISH FRESH-WATER POLYZOA. A Monograph of the. By Professor Allman, F.R.S. With 11 plates (10 coloured). Imp. 4to. pp. lig. jt'l.lls. 6d. RECENT FORAMINIFERA OF GREAT BRITAIN. A Monograph of the. By Professor Williamson. With 7 plates. Imp. 4to. pp. loo. ^1. lis. 6d, OCEANIC HYDROZOA, On the. By Professor Huxley, F.R.S. With 12 places. Imp. 4to. pp. 141. ^1. lis. 6d. BURMEISTER ON THE ORGANIZATION OF TRILOBITES. With 6 plates; translated from the German, and edited by Professors Bell and E. Forbes. Imp. 4to. pp. 136. 153. A SYNOPSIS OF THE BRITISH NAKED-EYED PULMOGRADE MEI)US.?2. With 13 coloured Plates, drawings of all the species. By Professor E. Forbes, F.R.S. Imp. 4to. ^'1. Is. BRITISH NUDIBRANCHIATE MOLLUSCA. A Monograph of the (with coloured drawings of every species). By Messrs. Alder and Hancock. Imp. 4to. Parti. ^'1. lOs. Part II. £\. 10s. Part III. ^'\. 10s. Part IV. ^1. 10s. Part V. 4?1. 10s. Part VI. £\. Is. Part VII. ^'1. Is. THE BRITISH SPIDERS. A History of the Spiders of Great Britain and Ireland. By John Blackwall, F.L.S. Two Parts, coloured by hand. Folio, £Z. 13s. 6d. INTRODUCTION TO THE STUDY OF THE FORAMINIFERA. By W. B. Carpenter, M.D., F.R.S., F.L.S., &c. ; assisted by W. K. Parker, Esq., and T. Rupert Jones, Esq., F.G.S, In 1 vol. Imp. 4to. pp. 319, with 22 plates. £\. lis. 6d. ON THE GERMINATION. DEVELOPMENT, AND FRUCTIFICATION OF THE HIGHER CRYPTOGAMIA, AND ON THE FRUCTIFICATION OF THE C0NIFER;£. By Dr. Wiluelm Hofmeister. Translated by Frederick Currey, M.A., F.R.S., Sec. L.S. In 1 vol. Svo. cloth, pp. 50(i, with 65 plates, ^'l.&s. 6d. Fully Illustrated, well printed, wonderfully cheap. CHYMISTRY (An INTRODUCTION to). 144 pages, price 6d. ; or. Three Parts, 2d. each. Uniform with the above — WALKINGHAME'S ARITHMETIC. 4d MACKENZIE'S TABLES. 2d. MECHANICS. Complete, 4d. ; Two parts, 2d. earh. HYDROSTATICS. Complete, 2d. HYDRAULICS. Complete, 2d. MURRAY'S GRAMMAR. Complete, 2d. BOOKKEEPING. Complete, 2d. MAVOR'S SPELLING. 4d. PHRENOLOGY. 2d. SHORTHAND. 2d. Useful Works published hi/ Rolert Hardicicke. 5 Published Annually, Second Year of publication ; Price £\. IGs. Tlie County Families of the United Kingdom. Or, Royal Manual of the Titled and Untitled Aristocracy of Great Britain and Ireland, containing a brief notice of the Descent, Birth, Marriage, Education, and Appointments of each Person, his Heir Apparent or Presumptive, as also a Record of the Offices which he has hitherto held, together with his Town Address and Country- Residences. By Edward Walford, M.A., late Scholar of Balliol College, Oxford, and Fellow of the Genealogical and Historical Society of Great Britain. " We find in this most convenient handbook the living representatives of those who have earned rank for themselves and for their descendants. We have records of the military or naval services in the titles of Wellington, Marlborough, Hovvden, Amherst, Anglesey, Cadogan. Charlemont, Cathcart, Dartmouth, Dorchester, Gardner, Gough, Hardinge, Harris, Hill, Huntly, Keane, Powis, Raglan. Seaton, Stamford, Stanhope, Stratford, Vivian, Nelson, St. Vincent, Camperdown, De Saumarez, Hood, Exmnuih, Hawke, Mulgrave, and Sandwich. Official services are represented by Clifford, Albemarle, Dunfermline, Sidmouth, Congleton, Glenelg, Holland, Lauder- dale, Wonteagle, Onslow, Oxford, Melville, Uipon, Salisbury, Shannon, and Sydney. Success in commerce and trade is represented in Fitzwilliam, Leigh, Petre, Darnley, Carrington. Ovcrstone, Leeds, Craven, Greville, Radnor, Ducie, Pomfret, Tankerville, Dormer, Coventry, Romney, Dudlow, Dacres, and Ashburtou. Political services have elevated Lowther and Massareene ; diplomatic services, Berwick, Cowley, Durham, Malmesbury, Granville, Harrington, Heytesbury, Rivers, and Stratford de Redcliffe. The fortunate lawyers have contributed Tenterden, Thurlow, Eldon, Plunket, Uedes- dale, Rosslyn, Walsingham, Campbell, Stratheden, St. Leonards, Lyndhurst, Truro, KUenborough, North, Hardwicke, Cottenham, Cowper, Kenyon, Lovelace, Man- chester, and Manners. The ' Romance of the Peerage' is written in titles such as these. The mercer, the skinner, and the silk-merchant, the merchant tailor, the draper, the wool-stapler, the cloth-worker, the Calais or Cheapside merchant, the banker, the jeweller, the goldsmith, and the apothecary (Smithson), like the gallant admiral, the general, and the gentlemen of the long robe or of red tape, have, when enterprising and energetic, founded noble families." — Literary Gazette. " It possesses advantages which no other work of the kind that we know of has offered hitherto. Containing all that is to be found in others, it furnishes information respecting families of distinction which are not to be found in the latter. It will prove to be invaluable in the library and drawing-room." — Spectator. " To produce such a work in the perfection which characterizes ' County Families,' must have been an almost Herculean task. It is sufficient for us to say that accuracy even in the minutest details appears to have been the aim of Mr. Walford, and the errors are so few and slight, that they may readily be passed over." — Weekly Register, By the same Author, The ShilKng Peerage ; The ShiUing Baronetage ; The ShiUing Knightage; and The Shilhng House of Commons. By E. Walford, M.A., Balliol College, Oxford. New Edition, for 1864, just published. G Useful Woi'ks puhUshcd hy Robert Hard icicle. Crown 8i;o. price 6s., Seventh Edition, Our Social Bees. Pictures of Town and Country, and other Papers. By Andrew Wynter, M.D. Contents : — The Post-office. — London Smoke. — Mock Auctions.^ Hyde Park. — The Suction Post. — St. George and the Dragon. — The India-rubber Artist. — Our Peck of Dirt. — The Artificial Man. — Britannia's Smelling-bottle. — The Hunterian Museum at the College of Surgeons. — A Chapter on Shop Windows. — Commercial Grief. — Orchards in Cheapside. — The Wedding Bonnet. — Aerated Bread. — The German Fair. — Club Chambers for the Married. — Needle-making. — Preserved Meats. — London Stout. — Palace Lights, Club Cards, and Bank Pens. — The Great Military Clothing Establishment at Pimlico. — Thoughts about London Beggars. — Wenham Lake Ice. — Candle Making. — Woman's Work. — The Turkish Bath. — The Nervous System of the Metropolis. — Who is Mr. Reuter .' — Our Modern Mercury. — The Sewing Machine. — The Times' Advertising Sheet. — Old Things by New Names. — A Suburban Fair. — A Fortnight in North Wales. — The Aristocratic Rooks. — The Englishman Abroad. — A Gossip about the Lakes. — Sensations of a Summer Night and Morning. — Physical Antipathies. — The Philosophy of Babydom. — Brain Difficulties. — Human Hair. " The papers are treated in such a manner as to form not merely an interesthijr, but an instructive contriliution to the stock of popular literature, and the volume is therefore a welcome contribution to our current literature." — Observer. " The ' Curiosities of Civilization' contained so many amusing and important details, that a second selection will be accepted at once v.ith the utmost gratification by the many readers who have already been fascinated by Dr. Wynter's agreeable style, and the characteristic details of men and manners by which he has rendered his name popular. Sometimes the first dish is more palatable than the second. — the newest entreniet serving to take off the pleasant taste of its predecessor. In this instance it is not so, since Dr. Wynter has kept back the better portion for a second course." — Bell's Weekly Messenger. " Crowded with facts and sparkling with fancy ; written in a cheerful and philo- sophic spirit. The writer is never unapproachable in his ideal, but shrewd, sensible, and thoughtful in his mode of narration and in his way of marshalling facts." — Literary Gazette. " On the whole, we prefer this volume, as a book of amusement, and even in- struction, to the ' Curiosities of Civilization,' which has enjoyed a good name and sale. Dr. Wynter is an accomplished and well-informed man; he writes well, has much to tell, and even his lightest sketches convey substantial thoughts or facts in their delicate outlines. This volume contains more than forty papers gleaned from first-rate periodicals. It would have been a literary loss had they not been so gathered and preserved. Sometimes there is a quaiiitness in some of the essays which recalls the immortal Charles Lamb." — Em. " These papers are characterized by the same breadth of view, the same felicity of language, the same acuteness of thought, which distinguished the ' Curiosities of Civilization.' So long as Ur. Wynter continues to write papers similar to those in the volume before us, and in ' Curiosities of Civilization,' so long will the republication of those papers be welcomed by the public." — Standard, Useful Works puhUsJied hy Rohert ffardinclr. Seventh Edition, Croion 8yo. price 6*. Curiosities of Civilization. Being Essays from the Quarterly and Edinburgh Reviews. By Dr. Andrew Wynter. CONTENTS. The London Commissariat. Food and its Adulterations. Advertisements. The Zoological Gardens. Rats. Woolwich Arsenal. Shipwrecks. Lodging, Food, and Dress of Soldiers. The Electric Telegraph. Fires and Fire Insurance. The Police and the Thieves. Mortality in Trades and Profes- sions. Lunatic Asylums. *' We shall look in vain, for example, two centuries hack, for anything; like an equiva- lent to the volume before us. Some of ihe articles are mainly derive i from observations made in the course of professional studies ; others are at least cognate to the subjects which occupy a physician's hourly thoughts ; all are more or less instructive as to certain phases of our civilization, and the strange elements it holds in suspension. Some of the incidents are of unparalleled magnitude, quite as striking as anything contained in the wonder-books of our ancestors." — Times. " Ur. Wynter's papers show that he has made deep researches, and that he brings to bear upon them the acumen of a well-stored mind — a perfect kaleidoscopic array of subjects." — Morning Post. " Ur. Wynter has both industry and skill. He investigates all branches of his subjects, and tells us the result easily and unaffectedly. In short, a better book of miscellaneous reading has not come under our notice for a long while." — Daili/ News, " One of the most amusing and best-executed works of its kind that ever came under our notice. Every subject that Dr. Wynter handles, even if it refers to scien- tific matters, is ground di>wn so very fine, that it is hardly competent to human stupidity to fail to understand it." — Satttrday Review, " These articles form a delightful inventory of facts, in which every reader has a direct personal interest, for they are such as may or do affect him and his at every moment of their lives, and collectively they form a very curious insight into the anatomy of some parts of our civilization past and present. Seldom have the fruits of so much labour been converted into more easy and pleasant reading." — Spectator, " It would have been a pity if so much that is useful and entertaining had been entombed in the pages of a review. The subject-matter was worthy of being put into a book, and we are glad that it is done." — Illustrated News. "Among the various Essays by eminent and brilliant writers, none surpass Dr. Wynter in instructiveness, amusing information, and easy cleverness of style. If any one ' wants to know ' how our great Babylon is supplied, with unerring certainty and sound calculation, with food and drink, day after day and year after year ; how that food is systematically and universally doctored and adulterated ; how our thieves operate, flourish, come to grief, and are affected by the police who are employed to detect or capture them: how men are slowlv murdered by unhealthy trades, and how ^he professions kill or keep alive tneir members ; now tires influence fire insurance, and fire insurance influences fires ; how and what sort of people dwell in lunatic asylums ; how many romantic and least-imagined things can be learnt by studying the shipwrecks which have occurred during the last few years ; how — but we will stop, and simply add, that whoever wants a^'i'esiV/e book this winter, rich in useful facts, and written in a manner clear, fascinating, and original, had better purchase Dr. Wynter's Curiosities of Civilization," — Mining Review, Price 2s. 6d. Illustrated by the Best Artists. THE POPULAR SCIENCE llEVIEW, A QUARTERLY MISCELLANY Of Entertaining & Instructive Articles on Scientific Subjects. EDITED BY HENRY LAWSON, M.D., Professor of Fhi/siiilng!/ in Queen's Cnllf^e, Birminghnm, and one of the Lecturers on Natural ilcience under the " ScUnce mid Art Department of the Committee of Council on Education." The Popular Scien'cb Revikw is, as its name implies, a Review conveying scientific knowledge in such a simple and popular form, tliat all wlio nadmay understand. There is at the present day a numerous and increasing class ol intelligent readers who, without being scientific, are nevertheless greatly inte- rested in scientific progress. They would wiUingly become acquainted with scientific truths, but are too often deterred from the pursuit of such studies by the abstruse or technical language in which these truths are conveyed. In order to meet the requirements of this portion of the community, every available means has been adopted to procure the most accurate information on all subjects of which the journal treats. No pains or e.xpense has been spared to secure the most skilful artists to illustrate its pages. Each number contains systematic, instructive articles illustrated when needlul) on subjects connected with some of the following sciences, viz., ASTROVOMV, I GuOGRAPHy, I Ml.MKRA LOG V, Botany, I Gkolocv, I Physics, Cmumistry, I Mktam.i'uov, ] Zoology, Eth.volocy, I Microscopy, I &c. &c., and SciKNCK applied to the Arts, Manufactures, Commerce, and Agriculture. CONTRIBUTORS. Andrews, W., M.R.I. A. (V.-P. of the Zoological Society of Ireland). AvsTKD, Professor, F.R.S., F.G.S. BoNn, Prof. F., MB., FC.S. (Hartley Institute, Soutbamiiton). Brekn, James, F.R A.S. buckland, f., f.z.s. BucKMAN, Prof. J A.vKs,F.L.S., F.G.S. CoLLiNGWoon.C, M.A., M.B., F.L.S. COOKK, M. C. COULTAS, HARLAVD. CrOOKES, WlLLIASI, F.R.S. De Quatrekaces, Professor. Fairbairv, W., LL.n.. F.R.S. Fraskr, W., M.D., F.L.S. Gore, George. GossE, Philip H., F.R.S. Hogg, Jabez, M.R.C.S.. F L.S., Ac. HoL'GnroN, Rev. W., F.L.S. Hi'NT, Robert, F.R.S. Jesse, E., F.L.S. Jones, Prof. Ry.mkr, F.R.S. King, Prof. (Queen's Coll., Galway) Lankkster, E., M.D., F.R.S., &c. Lankestkr, Mrs. Lewks, George H. Pluks, Miss M. Phipson, J., M.B., Ph.D., F.C.S. Seemann, B., Ph.D., F.L.S , &c. TusoN,Pror., F.C.S. (Royal Vtt. Col ). VoELCKFR, Prof., F.C.S. (Agricultural Coll., Cirencester). And other Writers who take a prominent part in Scientific Literature. " This is a wonderful half-crown's worth ; its text, as well as its e.xcellent and accurate illustrations, show it to be one of our cheapest and best periodicals. In this its second, as in its first number, it is fully up to the very highest standird fi.xed by its conductors. We wish it every success, and we heartily commend it to such of our readers as take an interest in the various phases of popular science." — Sta?idard. The "Popular Science Heview" appears in October, January, April, and July, price HaU-a-CrowTi. Price to SuOso-ibers, 10*. per Annum, Carriage Free. LONDON: ROBERT HARDWICKE, 192, PICCADILLY, W. Cox S( Wyman, Printers, Great Queen Street, London, W. C. USEFUL WORKS. Peter Schlemihl. From the Germcn of ADELBFRT VON CHAMISSO. Translated bv Sir JOHN KOWUING, LU.V., &c. Crown 8vo., cloth, with Illustrations by George Cruik»hunk, price '2a. 6J. ; the Illustrations on India paper, price 5a. Whist. The Laws and Practice of Whist, as played at the London Clubs. By C(ELEBS. With coloured Frontispiece. l6mo., cloth, gilt edges, price 'Js. fid. Horse Warranty : A Plain and Comprehensive Guide to the Various Points to oe noted, showing which are Kssential and which are Unimportant. With Forms of Warranty. By PE'lEU HOWUKN, V.S. Fcap. 8vo., cloth, prce 3s. 6d. Graceful Riding ; A Pocket Manual for Kquestrians. By S. C. WAITK. With Illustrations. Fcap. 8vo., cloth, price V?. 6(1. " In the »chooI, on the road, on the course, or across country, this little book will be invaluable ; and we heartily recommend it.*' — 3ti:rning Font. The Plagues of our Domestic Animals, and their Prevention. Being Lectures delivered by Professor GAJIGEE at the Royal Airricultural College, Cirencester. To which is added the Report of the Congress of Veterinary Surgeons held at Hamburg in 1863. The Science and Practice of Farm Cul- tivation. By ProfesFor BUCKMAN, F.L.S., F.G.S. Fully lUuslrated, price r». Gd., bound in cloth ; each part separately, price Is. 1. How to Grew Good Roots. 2. How to Grow Goo() Grasses. 3. How to Glow Good Clover. 4. How to Grow Good Corn. 5. How to Grow Good Hedges. 6. How to Grow Good Timber. 7. How to Grow Good Orchards. Hardwicke's Shilling Handy-Book of London. An Easy and Comprehensive Guide to Everything worth Seeing and Hcirlng. Rb\al 3Smo., cloth, price Is. CONTENTS. Bazaars. Ball-rooms. Cathedrals. Dining-rooms. Exhibitions. Mansions of Nobility. Markets. Money-order Offices. Omnibuses. Palaces. Parks. Passport Offices. Picture Galleries. Popular Entertainments. Police-courts. Prisons. iUing Guide to London Charities Showing;, in Alphabelical Order, the Name, Date of Fc • 7 ' n. Addip*, Object, AnBoal locome. Number of People benefited. Mod i \| nlicatloa to and Chief OlDcers of tv.Tv Institution in London. ByHKK.iiU KUY. Published Annually. A Manual of Geography : Being a Pc*eripti«n of the Natural Featarca, Cluoate, and Production of the various regioni of the Rarth. By FRANCIS MORTON. C.E. Limpoiotb, li. ; Bound in l^cather, with coloured Map*, li. 6d. ; in paper, witlRrat Map*. Od. On Obsciu'e Diseases of th<' Biahi and Disorders of the Mind. BjrPr. FORBES WINSLOW, D.C.L. <>< ' ' in ,,ri cheap Edition, price 10b. 6d. "The unanimoui roice of home and foreigrn contmentatont hu rciteratfd approval of thiiaUndard work. It is the teaubook of English medical psychology, and such it must continue as long ai accurate description of *ital phenomena i« prised by the pbysieian. The volume is a vast diniquCi faUhfull}- ana grnphically portraying the author's practical ob« ervationa/'— i>aMccl< A Popular Manual of Physiology : Being an Attempt to Eiplain the Science of Life in Untechnical Language. HENUV LAWSON, M.U., Professor of Physiolfgy in Queea'a College, mingbim ;' and one of the Lecturers on Natural Science, under the Seieace .Art I 'cpattment of the Committee of Council on Eililcation. Fcap. 8vo., \ ,u, -y lUiutrationa, price 'is, 6d. The InfluciKc of Railway Travelling Public Health. Froii'; tbe /yrtwctf/, Fcap. ftVo., cloth, price I it. By Sir. 1 CoiniiN Cottages. . . , A '^' ' i Designs f I- •'■ I ,• > ■ ' • w , ,, and Ireland, and gives a lirieC oftbedo 'M f .':i 1.1, r . I ''Ml, and appointments of each pe(^ heir apprir. ■ ■ • r . i. i^.. : the offices which he has beta, L with bu tuui. ^.ia{e*» j,i>d cwui.lr> roidencei. B/ KDWAllU WAt« M. A., late itcholw of Baliiol College, Oxford. Price ^l. Kit. 1,300 11,000 FamiliM.' The Shilliim IN'mi^re. The Shilling Baronetage. The Shilling Knightage. The Shilling House of Commons. A Comer <>r Kent : PR ^826 J717h Some Account ezialinc Antiijiii' folly illuatratol >ii. l>emT Svi.,, pric .'<. How to Address Titled People. Companion to the Writing- Desk ; or. How to Address, Begin, and End Letten to Titled and f>t8cial Personages, together with Tables of Precedence, copious list uf AbbrrriAtions, Rules for Punctuation, and other useful information. Royal :tJiiii.>., prii-e ig. A Hand Catalogue of Postage Stamps for Collectors. By Dr. JOHN EDWARD GRAY, F.R.S., t .1...-,.. Sic, of the British Museum. Price !».; liitcrlt-aviil u- Ai'Mi :,. j.. 0.1., gilt edges. LONDON: ROBERT HARDWICKE; 192, PICCADILLY. \.< ). \ I ' ■'t ■^v - ~ s , * :^' 'S '-^ *^ x»- -i'^i^ V's ^■"^ ^»-' •^ -:.-;.>^-:^.ra lH iU 1 "^'/V ^■.' ^H ^M ;.*/V^v5^ ■ H li ; ' < V ^H -^~ J. WH H -"^ • 'XSt'.! "^>^i^