WEMORIAl LIBRARY
•iNlVFRS'-Y OF ••TTRfMIReW

UNIVERSITY or PITTSBURGH

!-k

¥\

ESSAYS

ON

NATURAL HISTORY,

CHIEFLT
* BY

CHARLES WATERTON, ESQ.

Author of " Wanderings in South America."

SECOND SERIES:

WITH A CONTINUATION OP

THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF THE AUTHOR.

THIRD EDITION.

LONDON:

PRINTED FOR

LONGMAN, BROWN, GREEN, & LONGMANS,

PATERNOSTER- ROW.

1846.

Printea by a. shotiiswoopi;
New-i>trieet-Square.

PREFACE.

Happy the man, say the Spaniards, who has
written no more than one book. Important
remark ! when we consider the frailty of the
pen, the toil of composition, the clashing of
interests, and the sting of criticism.

Having been long ago impressed with the
truth of the remark above quoted, I had awful
fears within me, when the late Mr. Loudon re-
quested me to write a few papers which might
enable him to make up a little book of Essays ;
for I saw the danger of disregarding the whole-
some remark of my Spanish monitors, and I
felt apprehensive, lest the tiny reputation
which I had formerly gained by the Wan-
derings might be lost for ever by the pub-
lication of his intended undertaking.

Great then indeed must be my anxiety on
the present occasion, when I am rash enough to
deviate another time from the Spanish line of
certitude, into the mazes of chance and danger ;
where the track which I am to pursue is ill
defined and flinty, and may possibly lead me
and my new little book into some quagmire or
other ; there to perish without assistance ; the
scorn of the critics, and the pity of disappointed
friends. However, be this as it may, my die is
cast, my steam is on, and I am already at the
opposite bank of the Rubicon.

The volume which I now present to an in-
dulgent public, is an unsolicited donation to the
widow of my poor departed friend Mr. Loudon,
whose vast labours in the cause of Science
have insured to him an imperishable reputation.
If this trifling present on my part shall be the
medium of conveying one single drop of balm
to the wound, which it has pleased Heaven
lately to inflict on the heart of that excellent
lady, my time will have been well employed,
and my endeavours amply requited.

A part of its contents relates to the habits
of birds ; and I wish to draw the attention of the
young naturalist to it, because I have taken
great pains in selecting the materials from
actual observation in woods, and in swamps,
and on plains, where the theories of the closet
are unnecessary, and some of our new systems
incompatible with the simplicity of Nature.

To those gentlemen who reviewed the
volume of Essays in Natural History with a
favourable eye, I return my grateful thanks
Although I have not the honour of their ac-
quaintance, still their meed of approbation will
not be lost upon me. To those critics who
have thought fit to attack my puny offspring
with their puny bodkins, I am happy to say,
that their confederate thrusts have barely
effected a slight puncture on its skin. I have
it now again in my power to offer them half a
day of occupation. They ought to be thankful
for it, at a season when work is not always to
be obtained.

A 3

Having been informed that Mr. (now I believe
Professor) Macgillivray, in the first volume of
his Ornithology, has compared me to the carrion
crow, a bird acknowledged by the world at
large, to be of bad character and filthy habits ;
I take this opportunity (as I have not the com-
mand of a press) to observe that I am not aware
how I have procured the honour of such a dis-
tinguished attention ; and at the same time to
thank him for the store of tainted food which
he has helped to place in the Biography of
Birds, for the benefit of us needy ones of
rapine and ill omen.

A word also of Mr. Swainson. He has
accused me in the Cabinet Cyclopeedia, edited
by the unfortunate Doctor Lardner, of a " con-
stant propensity to dress truth in the garb of
fiction ! " I need say no more if the reader
will do me the favour to peruse a former letter
of mine to Mr. Swainson. In justice to myself
I have appended it to the present work.

Having begun the " Autobiography " in the
first volume, there seems a kind of necessity to
continue it in the second ; although I have not
yet made up my mind whether I did right or
wrong to take the subject in hand at all. If I
have erred in one instance, I equally err in
another, and I must make up my mind to receive
additional reproof. Cervantes says, " A nuevo
pecado, penitencia nueva," For new sins, there
must be a new penance.

Although I cannot expect that the description
of what I saw in the cathedral at Naples will
suit the taste of every English reader, I beg
to state, that my account of the miracle which
took place is most scrupulously true. I went
thither with my sisters-in-law expressly from
Rome to witness that, which has been the talk
of the world for many centuries; and I took
the journey, not so much to gratify my own
curiosity as to have an opportunity of giving a
faithful description of all 'that I should see

A 4

Vlll PREFACE.

on that interesting occasion. " Causa viae
Veritas."

As this will be the last time that I shall
appear before the public as an author (if indeed
I merit that appellation), I close my short preface
by taking a respectful leave of my readers, and
by w^ishing them from my heart, the inestimable
blessing from above of everlasting peace and
plenty.

Charles Waterton.

Walton Hall, Feb. 39. 1844.

COI^TENTS,

Some Account of the Writer of the following Essays, by
himself ....

Page

Flower-gardens and Song Birds - - - 1
On destroying Vermin in small Gardens, and on relative

Matters -....- 9

The Civetta, or Little Italian Owl - - - 15

The Powers of Vegetation - - - - 22

Thunder Storm at Walton Hall - - - 24

The Roller called Pica marina in Italy - - 26

The Holly - - - - - - 32

The Squirrel - - - - - - 40

Gigantic Raspberries - - - - - 44

The Cayman - - - - - - 46

The Yew Tree - - - - - 60

The Ivy - - - - - - 68

The New Chimney-sweeping Act - - - 79

Anecdote of a Combat betwixt Two Hares - - 87

The Wren, the Hedge-sparrow, and the Robin - 90

Waste Lands ----.. 100

X CONTENTS.

Page

The Canada Goose - - - - - 106

The Domestic Swan - - - - - 120

The Windhover Hawk and the Oil-gland - - 130

On the Food of Animals - - - - 133

On Fresh Air - - .- - - 145
On Beauty in Animal Creation - . - 156
On the Projected Banishment of the Rooks from Scot-
land - - - - - - 166

On Tight Shoes, Tight Stajs, and Cravats - - 174

SOME ACCOUNT

THE WRITER OF THE FOLLOWING ESSAYS,

BY HIMSELF.

(^Continued from Vol. I. p. Ixxxiii.)

" Barbiton hie paries habebit."

This beautiful line from. Horace is the last in
the last page of the former Essays. When I
laid down the pen on the 30th of December,
1837, I thought that I should never take it up
again. But it has only slumbered for a few
short years ; and the reader will see in the
preface to this second little volume, what " has
called it from the bed of rest." My adven-
turous bark is once more rash enough to try its
fortune on the high sea of public opinion,
where many a stouter vessel, better rigged and
better manned, has met an awful and untimely
fate.

Xll AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF

The first volume of Essays had not been
much more than a year on the " world's wide
stage," when I began to sigh for the comforts
of a warmer sun ; and I should have left these
realms of " Boreas, blustering railer," to those
who are fonder of his sway than I am, and
have gone to the South, had not a letter from
my friend Mr. Ord, the accomplished biogra-
pher of poor Wilson, informed me that he was
on his way from Philadelphia, to pass the
summer with us.

Upon the receipt of it, I gave up all thoughts
of Italy and her lovely sky; and set about
putting a finishing hand to my out-buildings,
the repairs of which had been begun in 1834,
and carried on at intervals.

They are an immense pile, composing an
oblong squai'e of forty-five yards in length, and
thirty-six in breadth, independent of the dog-
kennel, fowl-house, sheds, and potato-vaults.
They had been erected by my forefathers at
diiBferent periods, when taxation was compara-
tively in its infancy, and good old English
hospitality better understood than it is at the
present day. These buildings were gradually
going to ruin, through length of time and inat-

CHARLES WATERTON, ESQ. Xlll

tention to them during my absence ; but they
are now in thorough repair. Every department,
from the sty to the stable, has been paved, and
the pavement joined v^^ith Roman cement. In
front of them there is a spacious area all of
stone, and behind them a stone vs^alk equally
done wdth cement. The entire drainage con-
sists of one master drain and two smaller ones
tributary to it, and their mouths are secured
by an iron grate, moveable at pleasure.

I have been particular in this description,
from no other motive, but that the reader
might know by what process I have been able
to banish the Hanoverian rat, for ever I trust,
from these premises, where their boldness had
surpassed that of the famished wolf, and their
depredations in the long run had exceeded those
of Cacus, who was known to have stolen all the
milch cows of Hercules. The rats have made
themselves so remarkably scarce, that if I were
to offer twenty pounds sterling money for the
capture of a single individual, in or about any
part of the premises, not one could be pro-
cured. History informs us that Hercules
sent the Harpies neck and crop into Stym-
phalus ; and that Ferdinand and Isabella of

XIV AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF

Spain drove all the Moors back into Africa,
and in our times we see thousands of poor
Englishmen forced into exile by the cruel
workings of Dutch William's national debt.
When I am gone to dust, if my ghost should
hover o'er the mansion, it will rejoice to hear
the remark, that Charles Waterton, in the year
of Grace 1839, effectually cleared the premises
at Walton Hall of every Hanoverian rat, young
and old.

The time had now arrived when my two
sisters-in-law, my little boy, and myself, were
to wend our way to the delicious realms of
Southern Europe. But I stop to narrate a
circumstance which took place before our
departure. It may probably be of considerable
value in future cases of hydrophobia.

As a police officer, by name Phelps, was
going his night rounds in the town of Notting-
ham, he heard a dog barking in a hole which
had been dug for the foundation of a weighing
machine. His well-known humanity led him
down to the place ; and as he was lifting the
dog up a little ladder which he had brought
with him for the purpose of descent, he re-
ceived from the animal a bite upon his upper

CHARLES WATERTON, ESQ. XV

lip and nose. The dog on being delivered from
his prison, ran away with speed, and was never
heard of from that time. He must have
belonged to some gentleman ; for he was a
pointer, and in too good condition to be the
property of a gamekeeper.

The wound which poor Phelps had received,
was dressed by a neighbouring surgeon ; and
nature did the rest. But some six or seven
weeks after this, the officer began to feel that
there was something wrong within him. He
became better and worse alternately for two
days ; and then his disease showed itself with
every mark of virulence. He said to those
around him that he was going mad, and that it
was all over with him : and then he let fall a
tear as he mentioned his poor wife and children.
After this, according to the minute account
which was drawn out by Doctor Williams of
Nottingham, he proceeded to the watch-house,
and packed up his books which lay there ; and
turning to his companions, " Good-bye," said
he to them ; " I shall never come here again."
And then he went to Mr. Davison for medical
aid. Mr. Davison took him into his surgery,
and on the poor officer getting sight of running

XVI AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF

water, he was seized with convulsions. All
was done that could be done. The faculty ot
Nottingham, consisting of Doctor Williams,
Doctor Percy, Mr. Attenburrow, Mr. Sibson,
and Mr. Davison, had soon arrived ; and they
put in practice whatever their well known
knowledge of medicine could suggest, or their
pharmacy offer, to save this useful and respected
man from an untimely grave. But all in vain.
The terrible disease, with its concomitant
horrors of spasmodic affection, baffled all their
skill, and set their united science at utter
defiance ; for death was hurrying their patient
with unrelenting fierceness to his last resting-
place.

Whilst things were in this deplorable state,
an express was sent off to me late in the even-
ing, and I proceeded to Nottingham without
any loss of time, in hopes that the application
of the Wourali poison might be the means of
rescuing poor Phelps from the fate, which
nothing in the practice of modern medicine
seemed able to avert. When I had reached
Nottingham with my friend Sir Arnold Knight,
who had joined me at Sheffield, the unfortunate
police officer was no more. I saw him in bis

CHARLES WATERTON, ESQ. XVll

own house, lying on his back in bed, with his
family weeping over his remains. Death had not
changed his countenance, which had a serenity
diffused throughout it, not to have been looked
for in the features of one who had suffered so
much. Poor Phelps was an honour and a
credit to his employers, and I heard it remarked
that the corporation of Nottingham would ex-
perience a great loss in being deprived of his
trusty services. Indeed, there must have been
something " more than common in him," as my
Uncle Toby said of poor Le Fevre, for every
body in Nottingham seemed " concerned for
him."

Ere I left the town, I told the medical
gentlemen present that I had business at home
just then, which called me back; but that I
would return in a day or two : and that, if in
the mean time they would muster their scientific
friends in Nottingham, and from the country
round, I would be ready with the Wourali
poison, and then v^e might see by experiment,
if it could be used with safety in case of hy-
drophobia and locked jaw.

I revisited Nottingham on the day appointed ;
and we all went to the medical school, where

Xviii AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF

the Wourali poison was used before a crowded
audience. The process tried was nearly the
same as that which I have described in the
Wanderings, when the ass (which was called
Wouralia ever after) was operated upon uotil
it was apparently dead, and then restored —
after which it lived at Walton Hall for four and
twenty years in excellent health.

On this occasion in Nottingham, two asses
received the poisoned spike in the shoulder ;
and after yielding under the pressure of its
destructive powers, they were both restored by
the process of artificial respiration. The first
trial was a very long one ; and the operator,
my worthy friend Mr. Sibson, exerted himself
in a manner that astonished all the company.
The artificial respiration was kept up for
seven hours, before the prostrate animal ex-
hibited the least symptom of returning motion ;
and that was first observed in a momentary
quiver of the eyelid. This ass died I think on
the third day after the experiment. But cir-
cumstances had intervened, to the influence of
which, its death might in part be attributed.
The second case occupied a much shorter space
of time, and was quite successful. The ass is
stili alive.

CHARLES WATERTON, ESQ. XIX

Every person present seemed convinced
that the virulence of the Wourali poison was
completely under the command of the operator ;
and that, by this artificial process, its malignant
qualities could always be subdued. In a word,
the company present came to the conclusion
that it can be safely applied to a human being,
labouring under hydrophobia, one of the most
terrible and fatal of all the diseases that have
ever afilicted mankind.

Mr. Sibson has most wonderfully improved
the bellows, and thus rendered the process
much less laborious. He has by him a fair
store of the very poison which I brought from
the forests of Guiana in 1812. See the Wan-
derings. I myself have also a good supply of
it, as pure and as potent as it was on the day
in which I procured it.

In case of need, an application, either to
Mr. Sibson at the General Hospital in Not-
tingham, or to myself at Walton Hall near
Wakefield, will be most punctually attended to ;
and as railroad speed is now almost proverbial,
a communication with every part of the country
is put upon the easiest footing possible.

But I beg the reader in the most earnest
a 2

XX' AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF

manner, to give his attention to the following
remarks.

First, it is an acknowledged fact that the art
of medicine has hitherto heen unable to arrest
the fatal progress of confirmed hydrophobia.
This being the case, it is both wise and ex-
pedient to give the sufferer a chance of saving
his life by the supposed, although as yet un-
tried, ' efficacy of the Wourali poison ; which,
worst come to the worst, would, by its sedative
and narcotic qualities, render death calm and
composed, and free from pain ; a circumstance
not to be expected under the ordinary treat-
ment, or no treatment at all, of this ungo-
vernable and fatal malady.

Secondly, That as there can be no hope
whatever from supposed remedies usually ap-
plied, the patient must by no means be allowed
to take them, lest their pressure upon his con-
stitution should neutralise or totally counteract
the hoped-for good effects from the applica-
tion of the Wourali poison.

Thirdly, The disease generally takes three
days before it consigns its victim to the tomb,
during which time the paroxysms only occur
at intervals. Wherefore there will be time

CHARLES WATERTON, ESQ. XXI

enough to apply for the scientific assistance of
Mr. Sibson, except, indeed, in cases of extreme
distance. Until the arrival of this gentleman,
the patient might be placed under proper
restraint during the paroxysms, and after they
had ceased, he might receive support and con-
solation from his friends.

I wish it to be particularly understood that
I do not claim for myself the merit of this dis-
covery, should it prove successful. 1 certainly
paved the way to it by going in quest of the
poison, which I acquired in its pure state at my
own expense, and at the cost of my health.
But to Professor Sewell of the Veterinary
College in London, is due the merit of applying
it in cases of hydrophobia. He was the first, I
believe, who ever suggested the idea, and so
certain was he of a favourable result, that I
heard him declare before Sir Joseph Banks and
a large company of scientific gentlemen, that
were he unfortunate enough to be bitten by a
mad dog and become infected with hydrophobia,
he would not hesitate one moment in having the
Wourali poison applied, as he felt confident that
the application of it would prove successful.

When all had been arranged at Nottingham

XXll AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF

relative to the application of the Wourali poi-
son in case of hydrophobia, I took my leave of
the gentlemen assembled, and returned home.

Spring passed rapidly away, and when
summer had set in, I began to make arrange-
ments of a domestic nature for a visit to the
Eternal City, not having been there since the
year 1818.

Whilst things were thus in progression, T had
well nigh lost a servant by a singular accident.
One of my swans having died by disease, and
its mate by the horns of an unruly cow ; I had
the offer of a noble pair from the good Jesuits
at Stonyhurst to supply their place. My
gamekeeper having gone to meet them on the
way, his return was momently expected. The
night was dark beyond precedent, and the
servant hearing the noise of the vehicle, ran to
the bridge in order to be of assistance. But he
missed his way by about three yards from the
inner gate, and went at full speed over the
paved walk into the lake below. I was stand-
ing by the window at the time, and hearing a
plunge which I could not accoxmt for, I sprang
out of the window and hastened to the spot
from whence the noise had proceeded. There

CHARLES WATERTON, ESQ. XXlll

I heard a struggle in the water, and I instantly
called out to the man and told him to make for
the sound of my voice. He did so, and he
managed, by exertions of his feet and hands, to
reach the side of the wall, where I laid hold of
him and pulled him up by main force. He
was so confounded by the suddenness of the
accident, that at first he knew not what was the
matter with him. When he had come a little
more to Mmself, he said that he had been out
of his depth, and considered that all was over
with him, when on hearing my voice, he turned
to it, and got on his feet again by hard
struggling. The rescue was effected by sound
alone ; for the dense and black clouds, together
with the absence of the moon, had rendered the
night as dark as it well could be.

Few are the incidents and uninteresting the
adventures which generally occur in civilized
life, especially to one who has formerly been
engaged in forest roving, where ornithology was
seen under every pleasing shape, and has yet
far greater attractions for him than any other
pursuit. The uniformity of Belgium, the
flatness of Holland, the good cheer of Germany,
the picturesqueness of Switzerland, and the

XXIV AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF

fine arts of Italy, have been already represented
SO voluminously to our view by different and
indifferent English travellers, that there is
scarcely any thing remaining in these countries
from which a man may be enabled to glean a
handful of information sufficiently interesting
to be presented to a discerning public. With
Mrs. Starke in one hand, and the accurate
Murray in the other, who is there so imtutored
or so blind that cannot grope his way into
every nook and corner where these indefatigable
pioneers have been before him ? Every part of
their works bears evident proof of deep research.
With their discoveries at our call, the fault lies
at our own door if we get into bad quarters for
the night, or are disappointed in the quality of
food by day; for these useful writers have
opened to us a safe and a savoury store of good
things in almost every section of continental
Europe.

There is one part, however, of modern in-
formation from the pens of some of our English
travellers, any thing but pleasing or satisfactory
to about one third of her gracious Majesty's
subjects ; and on this point I would wish to lay
a little stress. I allude to the CathoKc religion.

CHARLES WATERTON, ESQ. XXV

Scarcely a book of theirs is handed from the
press, that does not contain some unbecoming
sneer or unfounded calumny against the faith of
our ancestors. Hence it follows that I inva-
riably take up books of travels with suspicion, and
too often have to discard them with marks of
disgust. I could name writers whose self-
sufficiency on this topic can only be surpassed
by their arrogance, and their arrogance by their
ignorance. Indeed, it is a difficult task to
decide whether their real want of information,
or their aversion to obtain it, is most to be com-
plained of. But should individuals professing
our faith, engage in a work intimately connected
with it, their literary labours experience very
little kindness and attention at the hands of our
dissenting brethren. Thus, on the appearance
of Lord Shrewsbury's pamphlet, after he had
undertaken a journey into the Tyrol purposely
to see the two holy virgins, the fame of whose
sanctity had spread far and near, his httle
work was received with abundant scoffs, whilst
those who gave vent to them, neglected to
advance one single proof condemnatory, either
of inaccuracy or of falsehood. Now I am forced
to agree with Lord Shrewsbury in every part of

XXVI AUTOBIOGKAPIIV OF

his Statement ; because I have had interviews
with eye-witnesses, whose unimpeachable tes-
timony fully corroborates it, and I have by me
just now the most minute particulars concern-
ing these virgins, written equally by eye-
witnesses whose characters are quite above
suspicion, and whose piety has not the slightest
tinge of fanaticism in it.

Certainly it would not be difficult to ferret
out sufficient cause why it has pleased Omnipo-
tence to withhold from England in these latter
ages, a frequency of those supernatural occur-
rences which history, both native and foreign,
does assure us, in the most positive terms, did
take place in this island during the long period
previous to what is generally termed the
reformation.

When our press teemed with remarks con-
cerning the Prince of Hohenlohe, at the time
that Almighty God, through his prayers and
those of the Church, had restored the arm of a
nun at New Hall, from the last stage of loath-
some disease, to one of perfect health and
soundness, I determined to travel into Bavaria
in order to gain indubitable information con-
cerning the astonishing cures which were said

CHARLES WATERTON, ESQ. XXVll

to have taken place there, and also in many
other parts of the Continent.

As I passed through Ghent, I saw two
females who had been cured during the mass
appointed by the prince, to be said in Belgium,
whilst he himself should be performing the
same sacred rite in Bamberg. One of these
was a young lady, by name Van Pettenghen,
the daughter of a wine merchant. She was so
grateful to Heaven for the cure, that she
dedicated herself to serve the poor in the
hospital of St. John for the remainder of her
days. Thither I went to see her, and there I
introduced to her Sir Charles Rowley, and his
nephew, a Post-Captain in the Navy, in order
that they might receive the account of her
miraculous cure from her own mouth, and at the
same time have an opportunity of asking what
questions they thought fit.

On my arrival at Huttenheim, the virtuous
secretary of the Prince of Hohenlohe showed
me piles upon piles of original documents, con-
taining authenticated accounts of cures per-
formed. One from America, upon Miss Mat-
tingly, the daughter of a mayor, was pecidiarly
interesting to me ; for I had arrived in the

XXVlll AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF

United States when the event was still talked
over in the coffee-houses, and in private society.
I passed a week at the house of the secretary,
and during that time I had free access to the
room which contained the accounts; and I
spent much of my time in perusing them, with
the scrutinous eye of a lawyer on a brief. So
clear were the statements, and so respectably
attested, that conviction flashed on my mind at
the conclusion of every page. These original
papers were copious enough to have formed
many volumes ; they contained the most satis-
factory proofs of individuals being cured, at all
periods of age, from the beggar to the prince.
I was particularly struck with the cure of the
Princess Schwartzenburg, and that of a French
lady, who had been stone blind, and who had
come all the way from the heart of France to
Bamberg, where Prince Hohenlohe then re-
sided. She attended at the mass, and no cur
took place ; a second mass was said on the fol
lowing day, with no better effect ; and then
the prince told her to be resigned, as it seemed
to be the will of God that she should remain
in darkness. Still her hope did not abandon
her, and she earnestly requested the prayers of

CHARLES WATF.RTON, ESQ. XXIX

the prince for a third time ; he complied with
her request : he said mass for her the day
after, and her full sight was restored to her
during the performance of it.

On my road to Huttenheim through Ghent,
an English gentleman, a total stranger to me
at the time, came up whilst I was standing at
the door of the Hotel Royal, Place d'Armes,
and after apologising for taking me aside, he
said, he had been informed that I was going on
a visit to the Prince of Hohenlohe's secretary ;
and upon that, he drew a paper from his side-
pocket, containing an account of a sick relative
of his, wishing for the prayers of the prince.
She was prayed for accordingly ; and it pleased
God Almighty that she should die. I pre-
sented another case, which had been confided
to me in England. It was of a young woman
who had been dismissed from the hospital as
incurable ; she was afflicted with a deep-rooted
cancer, which had made terrible ravages in her
face. She was prayed for, and she received a
perfect cure.

Many of my good dissenting brethren will,
no doubt, read this with a smile of incredulity
on their countenance ; but if they will consider

XXX AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF

the affair with cahmiess, they will find upon
reflection, that there is nothing new in the cus-
tom of praying to Heaven for a cure, through
the prayers of the Church. When one of their
own congregation is confined to bed by sickness,
the clergyman requests the people to join him in
prayer, that the invalid may obtain relief from
Heaven. The people would not do this, unless
they had a firm faith that a supernatural cure
may be obtained by prayer, when earthly as-
sistance cannot prevail. The Prince of Hohen-
lohe does no more than this.

But to return from this digression to the in-
tended trip to Italy. When I had finished the
arrangement of my domestic affairs, I called up
the gamekeeper, and made him promise, as he
valued his place, that he would protect all
hawks, crows, herons, jays and magpies, within
the precinct of the park during my absence.
He promised me faithfully that he would do
so ; and then, wishing him a good time of it, I
handed my two sisters-in-law, the Miss Edmon-
stones into the carriage ; I placed myself and my
little boy by them ; the two servants mounted
aloft, and in this order we proceeded to Hull,
there to catch the steamer for Rotterdam.

CHARLES WATERTON, ESQ. XX?a

I had a little adventure at Hull scarcely worth
recounting, saving for its singularity. As I
was standing at the window of the hotel, I saw
an old and weather-beaten tar, ruminating on
the quay which flanks the Humber ; and as I
had nothing to do at the time, I thought I
would go and have a little chat with him ; and
so, I took my hat and went to the place where
he was standing. " This is nearly the spot, my
honest tar," said I to him, " where I first em-
barked for Spain in the brig Industry of this
port. It is just now forty years ago, and a
rough passage we had of it to Cadiz ; we were
all but ashore, one dark night at Cape St. Vin-
cent. The captain's name was Lettus ; but he
must be dead and buried long ago, for he was
then apparently quite at his best ; and what
wdth so long a war, and so many perils of the
sea, no doubt he is safely stowed away in
Davy's locker." " I saw him, Sir," said the tar,
" no later than yesterday morning." " And
where is he," said I ? " He is safely moored in
the house for poor decayed sea-captains, and he
is as well and as happy as is possible for a
man of his years to be."

I bade my informer good-bye, and having

XXXll AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF

stepped into the inn for my umbrella, as the
weather threatened rain, I went down the
street in quest of my old commander. I found
him sitting on a bench facing the south, with a
pipe in his mouth, and I recognised him at first
sight, although disappointment, time, and po-
verty, had made deep furrows in his face. On
asking him if he remembered the interesting
afiair he had with a brig bound to Vigo, about
forty years ago ; his eye brightened up, and he
went through the whole story with wonderful
minuteness. I then gave him a brief account
of the many gales I had weathered since 1
bade him farewell at the sally-port in Cadiz ;
and he, on his part, told me that our mate,
Mr. Davis, had got drowned in the Baltic; and
that he himself had continued to buffet the
waves for a mere livelihood, till at last, old age
and poverty had dismasted him ; but that he was
now safe in dock, thanks to the generous peo-
ple of Hull ; and that he would be comfortable
there, in a good snug berth, with plenty of
excellent food, till death should break his crazy
vessel into pieces.

Having settled the little demands against us
at the Victoria Hotel, we went on board the
Seahorse, and steamed for Rotterdam.

CHARLES WATERTON, ESQ. XXXUl

Beautiful, indeed, is the former sedgy marsh
of Holland, and rich the people who have
drained and fertilised it. There is a placidity
and frankness in the Hollanders which at once
gain the good will of the traveller, on his first
appearance amongst them. The uniformity of
their country, and the even tenor of their
temper^, appear as though the one had been
made for the other. You may walk the streets
of Rotterdam from light to dark without en-
countering any thing in the shape of mockery
or of rudeness. I could see nobody pressing
forward with a hurried pace up the street, as
though the town were on fire behind him ; nor a
single soul whose haughty looks would give me
to understand that I must keep at a respectful
distance from him. No bird ever preened its
plumage with more assiduity than the house-
maid in Holland removes every particle of dust
and dirt from the fa9ade of her neat and pretty
dwelling. It seemed to me that she was at
work with her water-pail and broom from the
beginning of the week till late on Saturday
night.

Had the sun shone with sufficient warmth
and brightness, I could have fancied myself in
b

XXXIV AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF

the cultivated parts of Demerara, — a country
once the pride of Holland, ere we broke in
upon it during the revolutionary war with
France, and changed the face of all that she
had done before us. Our raising immense taxes,
and the profligate expenditure of them, did
neither suit the means nor the notions of these
frugal colonists ; whilst our overbearing de-
meanour as conquerors soon gave them to under-
stand that it was time for them to go elsewhere.
In 1824, when I last visited the wilds of Guiana,
scarcely a Dutchman could be seen either in
Demerara or in Essequibo. Numbers of my
former foreign friends had sunk into the grave ;
and numbers had gone to join their brethren
in Surinam, the last remaining colony of Hol-
land, on the terra Jirma of South America.

The stork, whose shape and habits at once
announce him to be a lover of swamps and
quagmires, is carefully protected in Holland.
The natives know his value ; and so good an
understanding exists betwixt themselves and
this bird, that he appears in the heart of their
towns without the slightest symptoms of fear ;
and he builds his huge nest upon the flat of their

CHARLES WATERTON, ESQ. XXXV

cliimney tops. Would but our country gentle-
men put a stop to the indiscriminate slaughter of
birds by their ruthless gamekeepers, we should
not have to visit Holland in order to see the
true habits of the stork, nor roam through Ger-
many to enjoy the soaring of the kite, — a bird
once very common in this part of Yorkshire,
but now a total stranger to it.

There is a bird-merchant in Rotterdam (I
have forgotten his name, but the attentive
Monsieur Walter, of the Hotel des Pays Bas
can give it) who has always a good collection
of living water-fowl on hand for sale. He is
moderate in his charges, and he appeared to
me to have a very fair practical knowledge of
the economy of those birds in which he dealt.
But he staggered me not a httle (and I saw he
read my astonishment in my face) when he
informed me that the widgeon makes its nest in
Holland. He was positive. So I thought it
would be wrong in me to refuse assent to his
asseveration, as I was ignorant of the locaUty
where he had made this important discovery.
From him I purchased the unfortunate ducks
and geese mentioned in my history of the

XXXVl AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF

Canada goose, and which had the unlucky ad-
venture through the rough streets of Hull,
when they were arbitrarily ordered to the
Customhouse by the ignorance of one officer,
and peremptorily sent out of it by the ill-
humour of another.

The Japan monsters, shown in the museum
at the Hague, are clumsy fabrications. 1 could
make better work with my left hand. The
moth has perforated them to a great extent.
Tis time, indeed, that they were cast out of the
way. One of them put me in mind of Ovid's
Famine, —

" Hirtus erat crinis, cava luniina, pallor in ore,
Labra incana situ, scabrae rubigine fauces."

But a sight of Potter's bull repays one for the
penance done in examining these mouldering
imitations of what may be termed death alive.

Celebrated as the museum at Leyden is in
most of its departments, that of zoology, as
far as preparation goes, is wretched in the
extreme. It is as bad as our own in London j
and we might fancy that Swainson had been
there with his own taxidermy, marring every
form and every feature. It is lamentable,
indeed, that such celebrated naturalists as

CHARLES WATERTON, ESQ. XXXVU

those of Leyden, do not see their error in
adhering to the old way of preparing specimens,
or, seeing it, do not try to improve it. Their
own knowledge of nature, and their innate
powers of perception, ought to give them
strong hints that the usual way of mounting
specimens in zoology is unsound, and ought to
be abandoned ; and that some other plan must
absolutely be adopted, ere a single sample can
be produced that would stand the test of scien-
tific examination. The bird with fresh-looking
feathers on a shrunk and shapeless pinion ; the
quadruped whose nose is dwindled into half its
size, and the serpent wrong at every fold, had
far better be exhibited as mere skins, than be
presented to public view bereft of every feature
they possessed in life. As skins, at all events,
we could look upon them with composure, and
leave the room without disappointment.

The change of religion in Holland threw
its magnificent churches sadly into the back-
ground, and there they have remained ever
since. Nothing can exceed the nudity and
gloom of the great church in Haerlem, where
the famous organ, that paragon of melody, is
said to surpass every other organ in the known

XXXVlll AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF

world. Whilst I was listening to its varied
sounds, I thought of a nightingale pouring
forth its own sweet song in an unfrequented
hayloft. There is not a single pious ornament
left in this church. The walls seemed damp
and mouldy ; and a ship or two in miniature,
probably mementos of some great naval victory,
are seen suspended in the vast and vaulted
void.

But whatever may be the notions of these
honest people concerning the value of holy
objects to assist the mind of man during the
time of his devotions, they have done every
thing for the comfort of the body throughout
the whole extent of their country. Hence
we see in Holland as fine country-houses, as
lovely gardens, as well regulated hotels, and
as comfortable cottages, as any flesh and blood
on earth can possibly wish for. I like the
Dutch. I know of no country in Europe
where human institutions appear to be upon a
better footing.

We ephemeral travellers, in passing through
a country like butterflies on a sunny day,
merely flutter over this flowery bank, or sip a
drop of nectar on that lily at the side of the

CHARLES WATERTON, ESQ. XXXIX

road ; but I am persuaded, if we tarried in
Holland for a sufficient length of time, and
became acquainted with the chiefs of the land,
we should have spacious stores of information
opened to our view. The zoological treasures of
private individuals from Java, and Sumatra, and
Surinam, must be very valuable ; and the per-
sonal adventures of the Dutch in those remote
countries are no doubt replete with instruction.
Surinam, so famous for its far extending forests,
its rivers, plains, and swamps, is still possessed by
Holland, as I have remarked above. I conceive
she is keeping an anxious eye on the working of
the new system forced upon her lost daughter
Demerara. Should philanthropists of Holland
loudly call for negro-emancipation, methinks
they ought to have it, with this proviso, how-
ever, — that those who demand the freedom of
the slave, should be saddled with the expenses
attending it. When our own benevolents were
urging the consummation of this affair in
England, our minister, in justice to the nation
at large, ought to have remarked : " I will grant
negro emancipation so soon as you yourselves,
and your supporters shall have produced from
your own purses, a sum sufficient to cover the
b 4

xl AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF

costs. At present I can do nothing for you in
the way of money ; I am already eight hundred
millions in debt. I must not rob Peter to pay
Paul."

Although Holland offers every comfort to
the weary traveller, and every luxury to the
epicure, we scarcely find an Englishman, not
in commerce, who is resident in any part of
this country ; whilst in Belgium, just at the
other side of the ditch, a country so like unto
Holland that it might be taken for Holland
itself, English families swarm like congregated
swallows towards the close of September.

Our countrymen are fond of what they call
seeing sights ; and there is undoubtedly a
greater sphere for this in Belgium than there
is in Holland, for Holland contracted hers con-
siderably by gutting her churches and shutting
their doors six days out of seven ; whereas the
Belgians have preserved their religious orna-
ments, and they keep their churches open
throughout the whole week. Tf we may judge
by the crowds of Englishmen who are for ever
sauntering up and down these Belgian churches,
we must come to the conclusion that they are
pleased with what they see. And still it can only

CHARLES WATERTON, ESQ. xli

be a feast for their eyes, as they know little or
nothing of the ceremonies which are performed^
or of the instruction which is imparted through
the medium of pictorial representations. " Hov/
have you got over your time, to-day ? " said I,
one afternoon to an acquaintance, who, like
Mr. Noddy's eldest son in Sterne, was travelling
through Europe at a prodigious speed, and had
very little spare time on his hands. He said
that he had knocked off thirteen churches that
very morning !

Whilst myself and sisters-in-law were at
Amsterdam admiring some of the pictures
which form part of the immense treasures pro-
duced by the Dutch artists, my eye was rivetted
to the spot by one which will be gazed upon in
after times with extreme interest. The spec-
tator will see represented, with great fidelity,
an act of self-devotedness noways inferior to
that which has rendered famous the name of a
Roman light-horseman, who mounted his steed
and rode it hearllong into a yawning abyss in
the Forum, by way of appeasing the wrath of
the immortal gods. The name of this modern
Curtius was Van Spek, commander of a brig of
war in the Batavian service. During the late

Xlii AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF

insui rectionary conflict with Belgium, this in-
trepid seaman, perceiving that all was lost, and
that he could no longer command his vessel
under his own national colours, he determined
to blow it up and perish in the wreck. He
disclosed his resolution to the crew, and told
them to retire from danger when he should give
the signal. Having invited as many Belgians
as possible on board his devoted man-of-war, he
made the promised signal to his men, and then
went down below. There he struck a light,
and applied it to the train which he had already
prepared. In an instant the man-of-war blew
up, and Van Spek and his enemies perished in
the ruins. However pagan history may sanction
dismal facts like this, Christianity shudders at
the very thought of them. Whilst we admire the
determined courage of the Dutch commander,
we lament that his patriotism should be stained
by the commission of so foul a deed.

Now that so many of our own swamps have
been drained, and their winged inhabitants
forced to disappear through hunger, or have
fallen before the gun of the insatiate fowler, we
must go to the morasses of Holland, if we wash
to improve our knowledge of water-fowl in

CHARLES WATERTON, ESQ. xliii

their native haunts ; for Holland is still very
rich in water-fowl, and the naturalist may ob-
tain his wished-for information there, in an
enjoyable manner, and on easy terms.

I saw much in Holland to put me in mind
of Demerara at every step. The mildness, and
urbanity, and good humour of the inhabitants,
had gained so much upon my feelings, that I
felt a gloom come over me when I had arranged
all to go to Antwerp — a fine old city, but
not much to my taste, notwithstanding the
excellent cheer, and cleanliness, and moderate
demands at the Hotel d'Angleterre. I had
formerly known Monsieur Kats the naturalist ;
and on the morning after my arrival, I went
down the Rue du Convent to shake him by
the hand, and to have an hoiir or two in his
museum. He had succeeded admirably in
breedmg and rearing the summer duck of
Carolina. He told me that he seldom failed
of success, if he placed the eggs under a
domestic hen ; but that if he allowed the duck
to sit on her own eggs, it was always a failure, for
the newly hatched birds were too delicate to
go amongst the herbage with her, in this cold
and variable climate. He showed me a huge

xliv AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF

baboon from the coast of Africa. This appa-
rently half-reasoning brute, would lay hold of
a broom-staff, and manage to bring within his
reach a crust of bread, which had purposely
been placed beyond the range of his chain.

As the time of our departure for Bruges
was close at hand, I thanked Monsieur Kats
for his civiHties to me ; and then I bade him
farewell.

What is it that makes the Catholic town
of Bruges so attractive to English families,
many of whom have so unfavourable an opinion
of the faith of their ancestors ?

" Will the stork intending rest,
On the billows build its nest ?
Does the bee derive its store,

From the bleak and barren shore ? "

No. Bruges then, must have that within it
which can afford the comfort and convenience
denied to these good families in their own
country; otherwise they would never think of
leaving old England, to take up a permanent
abode in this place.

To me Bruges has charms inexhaustible ;
and did my habits allow me to prefer streets to
woods and green fields, I could retire to Bruges

CHARLES WATERTON, ESQ. xlv

and there end my days. Our second Charles
was fond of Bruges. He became a member of
its ancient society of archers, which still
flourishes in its pristine vigour ; and you may
see the portrait of this regal profligate in the
hall of the establishment, which you enter from
the Rue des Carmes.

In the same street is the renowned convent
of English nuns, under the spiritual direction
of the Patriot Abbe de Foere, whose charities
and talents are an honour to Belgium, and of
vast advantage to the inhabitants of this fine
old city. Would that some of the boarding
schools in our own country could turn to their
profit the example of the watchful ladies in
this holy establishment. Difference in faith
need be no obstacle to scholastic arrangements.
Into this convent no love-letters can ever gain
admittance ; nor has a scheming adventurer the
smallest chance of coming at wealth, by laying
plans to inveigle the unsuspecting victim into
his snares. The generous nuns are unwearied
in their exertions to prepare those entrusted to
their charge, both for this life and for the next.
There are members of my family, one, alas no
more, who have reason to bless the day in

Xlvi AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF

which they entered this elegant retreat of
plenty, peace, and piety.

The church of the convent is worthy of the
name in every point of view ; and its marble
altar, originally from Rome, is a master-piece
of ornamental architecture. On the wall over
the grate in the audience room for visiters,
there hangs a picture of a boy laughing at his
own performance on the fiddle. So true is this
to nature, that you can never keep your eyes
from gazing on it whilst you are sitting there.
Were thieving innocent, and the act injurious
to none, I would set my brains at work how to
purloin this fascinating picture ; and then if I
succeeded in adding to it the representation of
a dead bittern suspended by the leg in the
Academy of Arts, I would consider myself owner
of two paintings, at which you might gaze and
gaze again, and come again and gaze, and
never feel fatigued with gazing at them.

At the fatal period of the suppression o^
monasteries in Belgium, when Joseph II. had
plundered their treasures and dispersed the
monks ; his government was so fearful of public
execration and of the consequences arising
from a proceeding so unjust, that it actually

CHARLES WATERTON, ESQ. xlvii

hired wretches from the lowest of the people,
and clothed them in the habits of the exiled
religious. Under this scandalous disguise, they
were made drunk, and went up and down the
streets as monks, to show the people how glad
they were to be released from their religious
vows.

At Ghent there is a splendid show of os-
teology in the museum under the scientific
direction of Monsieur de Duyts, whose urbanity
and knowledge of natural history, enable his
visiters to pass many a pleasant hour in the
apartments.

When the monks flourished in this city,
there was a huge chaldron called St. Peter's
pot. Above half an ox with the requisite
vegetables was boiled in it every day, and dis-
tributed gratis to the poor of that district.
When a couple were to be married, the curate
never inquired what means they had of sup-
port, if they assured him that they had access
to St. Peter's jpiot. Times are altered. Pikes
and halberds now glitter on the spot, where
once this savoury chaldron used to boil.

" Fugere pudor, verumque, fidesque,

In quorum subiere locum, fraudesque dolique."

Xlviii AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF

In Ghent, too, is the Beguinage ; a conven-
tion of females who assemble for public prayer
every day in a handsome church belonging to
the establishment. They are not recluses, nor
under the observance of perpetual vows. It is
a kind of partial retirement for them from the
disgust or fascinations of a cheating world.
They pass their time in doing good works and
in holy prayer; far removed from the caustic
gossip of the tea-table, or from the dissipations
of nocturnal gadding. It was a Beguine who
attended Corporal Trim so charitably, after he
had got wounded in the knee at the battle of
Lauden.

But it is time to travel onwards. Were I to
tarry long in the different abodes of art and
science in this interesting country, I should
terrify the reader by the apparition of two
large volumes at least : whereas, it is only my
intention to present him with one of small
extent, like the song of the stormcock in the
month of December.

I must skip from Ghent to Aix la Chapelle,
and just remark as I am going on, that the
valley of the Meuse on a fine warm day in July,
appears as rich, and beautiful, and romantic,

CHARLES WATERTOX, ESQ. xlix

as any valley can well be on this side of ancient
paradise.

And still I must not leave Dendermond
behind me, without a few words on the most
feeling and pathetic story ever told by the
tongue of man. Who can halt in Dendermond,
and not bethink him of my uncle Toby in
England, when he took his purse out of his
bureau, and went to befriend Lieutenant
Lefevre, who was sick at the inn ? Or who
can fancy this dying soldier, casting his last
look upon his weeping boy, without taking out
his handkerchief to dry his own eyes ? Or
who, in fine, can be unmoved, when he sees the
poor orphan youth receiving his late father's
sword from the hand of his kind benefactor?
How forcibly all this speaks to the soul ! and
" how beautifully it shows the heart of one, in
whose looks, and voice, and manner superadded,
there was something which eternally beckoned
to the unfortunate to come and take shelter
under him."

Aix-la-Chapelle stands unrivalled in the
efficacy of its medicinal waters. I say un-
rivalled ; for although fashion and interest may
extol the great advantages to be derived from

1 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF

other spas in Germany, I am satisfied that
every one of these advantages are to be found
at Aix-la-Chapelle ; and that they would be
reaped most abundantly, were it not that their
salutary effect is neutralised by the dainty cheer,
prepared with an unsparing hand, in every hotel
(if note, in this much-frequented town.

Here it is that we see people of dilapidated
frame, sitting down to a dinner which might
vie with Ovid's description of Chaos in its
materials, and in the nature of them.

" Frigida pugnabant calidis, humantia siccis,
MoUiacum duris, sine pondere habentia pondus."

As the partaker of this heterogeneous display
of aliment has to pay for admission to it, he
considers that he is entitled to value for value ;
and under this impression, his jaws belabour
his stomach so unmercifully, that all advantage
to be derived from the medicinal waters is
completely lost ; and his constitution gains no-
thing in the end, for the trouble and expense
of a visit to Aix-la-Chapelle. Physicians may
write what they please, and prescribe any mode
they choose ; but until they can compel their
patients to be moderate on plain diet, there will
be little or nothing effected in the way of a
permanent cure.

CHARLES WATERTON, ESQ. h

Every body is asking, Where do they give
the best dinners ? Where are the choicest
wines ? I myself always go to the Hotel du.
Dragon d'Or, where the good widow Van Gulpen
enables her company to counteract the salutary
effect of the waters, by as fine a display of
cookery as is to be found in the town. I have
sat there, lost in astonishment, at the enormous
quantity of food consumed by those who had
come expressly to Aix-la-Chapelle for the bene-
fit of their health.

Still the superabundant dainties of the table
are not the only obstacles to the good which
ought to be derived from the waters at this
celebrated spa. We know that in curing
diseases of the body, the mind, as in poetry,
must not be rufiled :

" Carmina proveniunt, animo deducta sereno."

But man's evil genius has formed an establish-
ment here, in which he has too often cause to
exclaim with the bard :

" Me mare, me venti, me fera jactat hyems."

This is no other than a gambling table in full
operation three times a day. Here, invaKds

lii AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF

assemble and try their luck, after which they
go to a sumptuous dinner, and then return to
gamble ; and, after tea and coffee, have another
spell at the seductive table. This splendid hall
of ruin is under the immediate care and pro-
tection of his Prussian Majesty's Government.
Every stranger has the gracious privilege of
breaking his fortune to pieces ; but not the
heads of his assistants ; for on losing his temper,
should he become unruly, there is an efficient
police close at hand to curb his impetuosity.

As I am fond of reading a man's actions in
the various changes of his face, upon which I
place more reliance than upon the tongue itself;
and as I have scrupulously followed the advice
of the good fathers of the Society of Jesus,
never to engage in any kind of gambling, I can
enter this saloon of danger, without the fear of
getting entangled in its meshes. Wherefore, I
have no difficulty in making my appearance
there. But how shall I attempt a brief descrip-
tion of countenances engaged in play at the
insidious tables of this frequented room ? Some
bear their losses with a kind of silent fortitude,
leaving their last penny in the bank, and their
unlucky chair to the next occupier. Others

CHARLES WATERTON, ESQ. Uil

show in tlieir sullen features, the awful work-
ings of despair within them : whilst others
break out in ungovernable fury. I was told of
an English officer who lost his all, and would
have beaten out his brains against a stove, had
the bystanders not interfered : and another
officer informed me, that he had thrown a mace
at the head of one of the croupiers with such
force, that it made a deep indentation in the
plaster of the wall behind him. I once as
sisted in forcing away to Dusseldorf a young
naval officer, from the hotel where he was
staying, in order to prevent him from risking
the remnant of his money at his favourite table
of rouge et noir.

Ladies, even ladies, are far from being shy
in trying their fortune at these delusive boards.
It is melancholy to see how the rose and the
lily take possession of their countenances by
turns, as the dice or ball shows in their favour
or against them.

As I was standing a silent spectator at one
of the tables, I saw a youth take the chair of
one who had just contributed largely to the
support of the bank. He was dressed in the
height of fashion ; and as I took a nearer view

c 3

liv AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF

of him, I knew at once who he was by the
striking resemblance which he bore to both his
parents. He sported gold in'abundance. Piece
disappeared after piece, till at last, his stock
was probably reduced to one ; for, on taking a
Frederick out of his pocket, he asked for
change in silver; — and having lost that, he left
the room. As I followed him with my eye to
the door, I whispered to myself, Aurifer atque
hilaris, venisti hue ; moestus abibis. Thinking
that he might possibly return in the evening, I
determined to give him the meeting, and to
make myself known to him ; and to put him
in mind, that a burnt child ought to dread the
fire. But he appeared no more.

What a sad exhibition is all this of the folly
and the frailty of human nature ! Kind Pro-
vidence has afibrded us an inexhaustible flow
of salubrious water at Aix-la-Chapelle, so easily
to be approached, and of such transcendent
virtue, that if we will only do it justice, we are
sure to reap the fuU benefit of it. But in lieu
of a corresponding efibrt on our part, we coun-
teract every expected advantage, by resorting
to the salle a manger, and there partaking of all
the luxuries from the cornucopia of Epicurus»

CHARLES WATERTON, ESQ. iv

Bacchus, and Ceres ; after which we put the
last impediment to the restoration of health, by
destroying the peace of the mind at the
gambHng table ; there to be flayed alive by
courteous butchers, to whom the government,
and the inhabitants, and the visiters themselves,
give every encouragement in the exercise of
their terrible and cruel calling. There they
are, and there they will continue by the united
consent and countenance of all parties con-
cerned; and there they will ease thousands of
their last farthing, by a process so pleasing, so
engaging, and at the same time so treacherous,
that neither youth nor age, nor sex, nor cha-
racter, can show fortitude enough to make an
effectual stand against it.

Nothing can be more charming in warm and
sunny weather, than the rural walks on the
wooded hill of Louisberg just above the town.
When you are sitting on the bench at the top
near the column, and casting your eye on the
surrounding scenery, you vnll say, that as a
whole, there cannot be a finer or a richer sight.
The Ardennes appear to great advantage. At
my last visit to the Louisberg, a pair of ravens
came and soared over my head, and exercised

c 4

iVl AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF

their various aerial evolutions for more than an
hour ; and then winged their flight towards the
Ardennes. As I watched their risings and
their lowerings, home rushed on my imagination,
and I bethought me of the rascally cobbler who
desecrated the Sunday morning by robbing the
last raven's nest in this vicinity. A willow wren,
larger, and of brighter colours than our own,
sang sweetly, although the season was far ad-
vanced ; and the black redstart was for ever
flitting from stone to stone on the ruined walls
of the hotel, which had been consumed by fire
during the preceding year.

The sun had now descended into the southern
world; whilst the winds of autumn drove the
falling leaves before them, and showed us that
it was time to leave the cloudy atmosphere of
Rhenish Prussia. The Rhine too, had but few
of its summer beauties left, although we found
at Strasburg a warmer sun than what we had
expected. Indeed, it was here that old Boreas
gave up the pursuit ; for, had it not been that
we encountered a keen and cutting wind as we
approached the summit of the Splugen, we
should have enjoyed, all the way from Stras-
burg, the genial warmth of a mild and sunny
autumn.

CHARLES WATERTON, ESQ. ivu

At Freyburg, where we passed a couple of
days, the cHmate was truly delicious ; and as
the vintage had only just commenced on the
day of our arrival there, all was joy, festivity,
and mirth. There was a German waiter at the
hotel, of extraordinary talent for acquiring
languages ; he said, he had never been in
England, nor much amongst EngHshmen, but
that he had written a description in English
poetry of their own cathedral. On saying this,
he offered me a little pamphlet, containing an
excellent engraving of that superb edifice, by
way of frontispiece. As I looked over the
pages, I found in their contents, matter much
superior to any thing that I could have ex-
pected from the pen of a German waiter at an
inn. Having complimented him on the suc-
cessful study of a language, by no means of
easy acquisition even to a native, I paid him
the price which he had asked for his work, and
I put it in my portmanteau, for future inves-
tigation ; but it now lies in the wreck of the
Pollux, at the bottom of the Mediterranean
Sea.

I had expected to have a sight of some of
our rarer European birds in my passage across

Iviii AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF

the Alps ; and in order to have a better chance
of success, I got out of the carriage and tra-
velled onwards on foot. But I saw none ; the
earth appeared one huge barren waste, and the
heavens produced not a single inhabitant of air
to break the dull monotony around us.

Charming is the descent down the southern
side of the Alps ; every day brought us a
warmer climate with it, and gave us a foretaste
of the delightful temperature to be enjoyed in
the delicious air of an Italian autumn. As we
were advancing slowly up a little ascent in the
road, my sister-in-law. Miss Helen Edmonstone,
who had just been looking out of the window
of the carriage, remarked with a considerable
archness of countenance, " I am sure that we
are in Italy now." Thinking that there was
something more than common, by the way in
which this remark had been uttered, I cast
my eye along the road behind us, and there I
saw a matronly looking woman, vdth her fingers
in full chase amid the long black hair of a
young damsel, apparently her daughter. " I
agree with you, Miss Helen," said I. " We
are in Italy, there can be no doubt of it ; pro-
bably in parts of this country, combs are not

CHARLES WATERTON, ESQ. llX

SO plentiful as they are with us. They must
jiave been scarce in the time of Horace, for he
remarks of Canidia, ' crines et incomptum
caput.'"

I am never prone to find fault with the
modes and customs of those countries through
which I travel ; always bearing in mind, that if
we here in England have the supposed com-
forts of life in a superior style, we pay in a
superior manner for them. However, I do
think in one instance, that the Italians would
confer a vast benefit on society, if they would
depose more fertilising matter in their fields,
and less in their streets ; or, in case the first is
not considered necessary, they might imitate
the excellent example of the good people of
Edinburgh in the olden time, when they had a
man clothed in an ample surtout, crying up
and down the streets at night, " Wha wants
me ? " At a distance, the appearance of the
Italian towns and villages, surrounded by olive
groves and cypress trees, is perfectly enchant-
ing; but on a near approach to them, every
favourable idea vanishes at once, and the tra-
veller cannot walk the streets with comfort,
unless he has his lavender-water with him.

Ix AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF

There was nothing in any of the museums
which I visited, to show that an advancement
had been made in the art of preserving spe-
cimens for natural history ; in that of Bologna,
I saw two male turkeys with a very thick and
long tuft of feathers on their heads ; their necks
were bare. I was informed that these strange
looking birds were mere varieties of the tribe,
and that they had been reared from the egg in
the immediate vicinity.

At Florence, my old friend Professor Nesti
showed us through the well-stored apartments
of the public museum ; we had not seen each
other for more than twenty years : as I looked
at him, I could perceive that age had traced
his brow with furrows ; and he, no doubt, must
have observed that Time's unerring hand had
been employed upon my ovm for a similar pur-
pose. Professor Nesti first introduced me to
the celebrated sculptor Bartolini of Florence.
On calling at his studio after an absence of
twenty years, I found him at work on a classic
group, which he had composed with great taste,
and was finishing in the first style of elaborate
sculpture. The group consisted of Andromache
in the imploring attitude of utter despair.

CHARLES WATERTON, ESQ. ]xi

whilst the unfeeling conquerors of Troy were
in the act of throwing her poor boy Astyanax
over the battlements !

" Mittitur Astyanax, illis de turribus, unde," &c.

I was invited to see in Florence a bird, a
mouse, and a piece of heart and liver, which by
a chemical process (only known to the in-
ventor) had become as hard as stone. I had
been given to understand, that I should find
the bird and mouse as perfect in their form as
when alive ; but upon examination, the ana-
tomy appeared shrunk and injured; the plumage
of the bird and the fur of the mouse were
wrong at all points, so that I left the room
%vith disappointment in my looks. Probably
corrosive sublimate had been the chief agent in
causing these substances to become so very
hard.

Although I was much on the watch for birds
from Florence to Rome, I saw very few indeed ;
some dozens of coots on the waters, a heron or
two rising from the marshes, with here and
there a noisy blackbird rushing from the bush
on the road-side, and a scanty show of hooded
crows passing from tree to tree, were nearly all

Ixii AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF

there was to tell us that animated nature had
not entirely abandoned the parts through which
we were travelling.

I had a little adventure on the road from
Baccano to Rome not worth relating, but which
I deem necessary to be introduced here in
order that some of my friends in the latter city,
and others in England, may not give me credit
for an affair which deserves no credit at all.
These good friends had got it into their heads
that I had reached Rome after walking bare-
foot for nearly twenty miles, in order to show
my respect and reverence for the sacred capital
of the Christian world. Would that my motive
had been as pure as represented ! The sanctity
of the churches, the remains of holy martyrs
which enrich them, the relics of canonised
saints placed in such profusion throughout them,
might well induce a Catholic traveller to adopt
this easy and simple mode of showing his re-
ligious feeling. But unfortunately, the idea
never entered my mind at the time ; I had no
other motives than those of easy walking and of
self-enjoyment. The affair which caused the
talk, took place as follows.

We had arrived at Baccano in the evening,

CHARLES WATERTON, ESQ. iXU]

and whilst we were at tea, I proposed to our
excellent friend Mr. Fletcher, who had joined
us at Cologne, that we should leave the inn at
four the next morning on foot for Rome, and
secure lodgings for the ladies, who would fol-
low us in the carriage after a nine o'clock
breakfast. Having been accustomed to go with-
out shoes month after month in the rugged
forests of Guiana, I took it for granted that I
could do the same on the pavement of his
Holiness Pope Gregory the Sixteenth, never
once reflecting that some fifteen years had
elapsed from the time that I could go bare-
footed with comfort and impunity ; during the
interval, however, the sequel will show that
the soles of my feet had undergone a consider-
able alteration.

We rose at three the morning after, and
having put a shoe and a sock or half-stock-
ing into each pocket of my coat, we left the
inn at Baccano for Rome just as the hands of
our watches pointed to the hour of four. Mr.
Fletcher having been born in North Britain,
ran no risk of injuring his feet by an act of
imprudence. The sky was cloudless and the
morning frosty, and the planet Venus shone

Ixiv AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF

upon us as though she had been a little moon.
Whether the severity of the frost which was
more than commonly keen, or the hardness of
the pavement, or perhaps both conjoined, had
deprived my feet of sensibility, I had no means
of ascertaining ; but this is certain, I went on
merrily for several miles without a suspicion of
any thing being wrong, until we halted to ad-
mire more particularly the transcendent splen-
dour of the morning planet, and then I saw blood
on the pavement : my right foot was bleeding
apace, and on turning the sole uppermost, I per-
ceived a piece of jagged flesh hanging by a string ;
seeing that there would be no chance of re-
placing the damaged part with success, I tvdsted
it off, and then took a survey of the foot by
the light which the stars afforded. Mr. Fletcher
horror-struck at what he saw, proposed imme-
diately that I should sit down by the side of
the road, and there wait for the carriage, or
take advantage of any vehicle which might
come up. Aware that the pain would be ex-
cessive so soon as the lacerated parts would
become stiff by inaction, I resolved at once to
push on to Rome ; wherefore, putting one shoe
on the sound foot, which, by the way, had two

CHARLES WATERTON, ESQ. ]xv

unbroken bKsters on it, I forced the wounded
one into the other, and off we started for Rome,
which we reached after a very uncomfortable
walk. The injured foot had two months' con-
finement to the sofa before the damage was
repaired. It was this unfortunate adventure
which gave rise to the story of my walking
barefooted into Rome, and which gained me a
reputation by no means merited on my part.

When we left the shores of England, we de-
termined to spend two years in Rome, reserv-
ing to ourselves the privilege of retiring from
it when the unwholesome season would cause
a longer stay there, neither safe nor any ways
agreeable. We set apart this period for a visit
to Naples, as it would be a good opportunity
to see the liquefaction of the blood of St. Janu-
arius, a prodigy which has given rise, almost
time out of mind, to every possible conjecture
throughout the whole of civilised Europe. But
of this more hereafter ; sufficient to say for the'
present, that we went to Naples and witnessed
the liquefaction.

Rome, immortal Rome, replete with every
thing that can instruct and please, is the resort
of travellers from all parts of the known world.
d

iXVl AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF

They have so deluged the press with accounts
of its economy, its treasures, and antiquities,
that there seems nothing left for future tourists
whereon to exercise their pens. For ray own
part, having seen most of the curiosities full
twenty years ago, I did not feel much inclined
on this occasion to renew my acquaintance with
many of them, especially as I found the tem-
perature of the galleries and palaces any thing
but genial. Still I got a sight of some things
which have made a lasting impression on me ;
one of these was the titulus which was fixed
over the head of our dying Saviour ; a most
learned rabbi of our days has proved its authen-
ticity, if any new proof were wanting; for the his-
torical records at the time of its being brought
to Rome are so clear and positive, that no one
who has any faith at all in history, can doubt
that this identical piece of wood is the same
that was used on the cross, when our blessed
Lord suffered for the sins of the world. The
wood itself is sycamore, and the words appear
as though they had been cut hastily into it by
some sharp-pointed instrument.

I fear the world will rebuke me when I tell
it, that instead of ferreting out antiquities and

CHARLES WATERTON, ESQ. Ixvli

visiting modern schools of sculpture and of
painting, I passed a considerable portion of my
time in the extensive bird-market of Rome. I
must however remark, that the studio of Val-
lati, the renowned painter of wild boars, had
great attractions for me ; and I have now at
home, a wild boar done by him in so masterly
a style, and finished so exquisitely, that it ob-
tains unqualified approbation from all who in-
spect it.

The bird-market of Rome is held in the en-
virons of the Rotunda, formerly the Pantheon.
Nothing astonished me more" than the quanti-
ties of birds which were daily exposed for sale
during the season ; I could often count above
four hundred thrushes and blackbirds, and often
a hundred robin red-breasts in one quarter of
it ; with twice as many larks, and other small
birds in vast profusion. In the course of one
day, seventeen thousand quails have passed the
Roman custom-house ; these pretty vernal and
autumnal travellers are taken in nets of pro-
digious extent on the shores of the Mediter-
ranean. In the spring of the year and at the
close of summer, cartloads of ringdoves arrive
at the stalls near the Rotunda. At first the
d 2

Ixviii AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF

venders were shy with me ; but as we gol better
acquainted, nothing could surpass their civility,
and their wishes to impart every information to
me ; and when they had procured a fine and
rare specimen, they always put it in a drawer
apart for me. These birdmen outwardly had
the appearance of Italian banditti, but it was
all outside and nothing more ; they were good
men notwithstanding their uncouth looks, and
good Christians too, for I could see them wait-
ing at the door of the church of the Jesuits, by
half-past four o'clock on a winter's morning, to
be ready for the first mass.

I preserved eighty birds, a porcupine, a
badger, some shell-fish, and a dozen land tor-
toises, whilst I was in Rome ; and these escaped
the shipwreck by having been forwarded to
Leghorn, some time previous to our embarking
at Civita Vecchia for that port.

Whilst we were viewing the lofty fragment
of a wall which towers amid the surrounding
ruins of Caracalla's baths, I saw a hole in it
which is frequented by the large eagle owl of
Europe. A fearless adventurer had managed
to get a young one out of it the year before,
and he had sold it to the gardener at the

CHARLES WATERTON, ESQ. Ixix

Colonna palace, who kept it alive in the
pleasure-grounds; and there I paid it a visit
generally once a week. Another pair of these
noble wanderers of night is said to inhabit the
enormous outworks at the top of St. Peter's.
These bii'ds are very scarce in this part of
Italy.

As you enter Rome at the Porta del Popolo
a little on your right, is the great slaughter-
house, with a fine stream of water running
through it. It is probably inferior to none in
Italy for an extensive plan, and for judicious
arrangements. Here some seven or eight hun-
dred pigs are killed on every Friday during the
winter season. Nothing can exceed the dex-
terity with which they are despatched. About
thirty of these large and fat black pigs are
driven into a commodious pen, followed by
three or four men, each with a sharp skewer in
his hand, bent at one end, in order that it may
be used with advantage. On entering the pen
these performers, who put you vastly in mind
of assassins, make a rush at the hogs, each
seizing one by the leg, amid a general yeU of
horror on the part of the victims. Whilst the

ds

IxX AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF

the latter, with the rapidity of thought, pushes
his skewer betwixt the fore leg and the body,
quite into the heart, and there gives it a turn
or two. The pig can rise no more, but
screams for a minute or so, and then expires.
This process is continued till they are all
despatched, the brutes sometimes rolling over
the butchers, and sometimes the butchers over
the brutes, with a yelling enough to stun one's
ears. In the mean time, the screams become
fainter and fainter, and then all is silence on
the death of the last pig. A cart is in attend-
ance ; the carcasses are lifted into it, and it
proceeds through the street, leaving one or
more dead hogs at the doors of the different
pork shops. No blood appears outwardly, nor
is the internal hemorrhage prejudicial to the
meat, for Rome cannot be surpassed in the
flavour of her bacon, or in the soundness of
her hams.

A day or two after our arrival in the Eternal
City, Fathers Glover and Esmonde, of the Pro-
fessed House of the Society of Jesus, came to
see me. We had been school-fellows together,
some forty years before, at Stonyhurst in Eng-
land, and our meeting was joyous in the ex-

CHARLES WATERTON, ESQ. Ixxi

treme. Nothing could exceed the disinterested
friendship which these two learned and pious
disciples of St. Ignatius showed to us during
our stay in Rome. Father Glover became our
spiritual director. The care which he took to
form the mind of my little boy, and the kind
offices which we were perpetually receiving at
his hands, can only be repaid, on our part, by
fervent prayers to Heaven that the Almighty
may crown the labours of our beloved foster-
parent, with the invaluable reward of a happy
death. When my foot had got well, after a
long and tedious confinement, Father Glover
introduced me to the present General of the
Society of Jesus. He is a native of Holland ; so
engaging is his deportment, so mild is the ex-
pression of his countenance, and so dignified is
his address, that it was impossible not to per-
ceive immediately that I was in the presence of
one eminently qualified to be commander-in-
chief of the celebrated order, the discerning
members of which had unanimously placed him
at their head.

I had long looked for the arrival of the day
in which the Roman beasts of burden receive
a public benediction. Notwithstanding the

(1 4

Ixxii AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF

ridicule thrown upon this annual ceremony by
many a thoughtless and censorious traveller, I
had figured in my own mind a ceremony holy
in itself, and of no small importance to the people
at large. " Renedicite, omnes bestiae et pecora,
Domino!" I conceived that the blessing would
insure to these poor dumb animals a better treat-
ment at the hands of man than they might other-
wise receive; and the calling upon our kind
Creator to give his benediction to a horse, which,
by one false step, or an unruly movement, might
endanger the life of its rider, appeared to me
an act replete with Christian prudence. I re-
called to my mind the incessant and horrible
curses which our village urchins vent against
their hauling horses on the banks of the Barnsley
canal. This aqueous line of commerce passes
close by my porter's lodges ; and as the first lock
is only a short distance from them, the horrid
din of curses commences there, and is kept up
by these young devils incarnate from week to
week (Sundays not excepted) with the most
perfect impunity.

At last the day arrived on which the beasts
of draught and burden were to receive a bene-
diction from the hand of a priest at the door of

CHARLES WATERTON, ESQ. Ixxiil

St. Anthony's church. The sun shone brightly,
and the scene was truly exhilarating. Every
horse, and mule, and ass, was decked out in
splendid colours, and in trappings corresponding
with the means of their owners, whose faces
bespoke the joy of their hearts, and whose
orderly conduct, at once proclaimed the re-
ligious feeling which had brought them to the
place. When the animals had received the
benediction, they passed onwards with their
masters, to make room for those behind them ;
and this was the order of the day, until the last
blessing upon the last animal brought the ex-
hibition to a close.

As this scene of primeval piety was going on,
an English gentleman, with whom I had a
slight acquaintance, and who was standing by
my side, remarked that he was tired with look-
ing at such a scene of superstitious folly. " If
it be folly," said I, in answer to his remark, " to
give a blessing to an animal in one shape, it is
certainly folly to pronounce a benediction upon
an animal under another. And still we all do
this in England, and in every other Christian
country. Where is the well-regulated family
which, on sitting down to a leg of boiled mutton

ixxiv AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF

and caper sauce, does not beg the blessing of
Almighty God upon it, through the mouth of
the master of the house, or by the ministry of a
clergyman, if present ? ' Benedicite, omnia
opera Domini, Domino ! ' Who ever thinks of
cutting up a young roasting-pig, immersed in
delicious gravy, and hot from the kitchen,
without asking a blessing on it ? — ' Bless us,
O Lord, and these thy gifts ! ' "

When the returning warmth of summer has
filled the upper air in the streets of Rome with
multitudes of swifts and house-martins, the
idling boys manage to capture these useful
visiters by a process at once surprisingly simple
and efficacious. They procure a silken line of
sufficient length to reach above the eaves of the
houses. To one end of this they attach a small
curled feather or two, and behind these is formed
a running noose. This apparatus is taken up
into the air by the current of wind blowing
through the street ; and as the poor birds are on
the look out for materials wherewith to line their
nests, they strike at the floating feathers, and get
their necks into the fatal snare, and are taken to
the bird-market at the Rotunda for sale. This
ornitholoGfical amusement is often carried on in

CHARLES WATERTON, ESQ. IxXV

the street of the Propaganda during the months
of May and June.

After the benediction by the sovereign pontiff
from the portico of St. Peter's has given the
world to understand that all the ceremonies of
holy vi^eek are over, the strangers take their de-
parture from Rome vv^ith a precipitation as though
the pestilence had shown itself within her walls.
We, however, determined to prolong our stay,
wishing to be present at the services during the
month of May, the whole of which delightful
time is dedicated to devotions in honour of the
blessed Virgin. It is called in Rome, " the
month of Mary ; " and these devotions are per-
formed in the church of the Jesuits with a
magnificence worthy of the occasion. The
beautifully arranged blaze of innumerable can-
dles on the high altar ; the heavenly music ;
the fervent prayers of the people, and the pro-
found attention of the officiating Fathers, all
tended to make a deep and a lasting impression
on my mind.

Our prolonged stay gave me an opportunity
of collecting specimens of those birds of pas-
sage so rarely to be seen in our own land, and
scarcely ever acquired in a state fit for pre-

Ixxvi AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF

paration. We had the golden oriole, the roller,
the bee-eater, the spotted gallinule, the least of
the water-rails, the African redstart, the hoopoe,
the egrette, the shrikes, and several varieties of
the quail, and I procured an adult pair of the
partridge of the Apennines in superb plumage.

Thus did time glide on, every day producing
something new to engage the attention of my
indefatigable sisters-in-law, and to give me suf-
ficient occupation in ornithology, so that we
felt somewhat low in spirits when the day
arrived on which we were to take our departure
for Naples. I saw more birds on the route
from Rome to Naples than I had observed in
the whole of the journey from England. Kites
and common buzzards, sparrow-hawks and
windhovers, were ever on the wing in the azure
vault above us.

As we were resting our horses at a Kttle inn
on the side of the road, I had a fine oppor-
tunity of getting close to a very large herd of
Italian buflfaloes. These wild-looking animals
have got a bad name for supposed ferocity, and
when I expressed my determination to approach
them, I was warned by the Italians not to do
so, as the buffaloes were wicked brutes, and

CHARLES WATERTON, ESQ. Ixxvii

would gore me to death. Having singled out
a tree or two of easy ascent where the herd was
grazing, I advanced close up to it, calculating
that one or other of the trees would be a pro-
tection to me, in case the brutes should provo
unruly. They all ceased eating, and stared
at me as though they had never seen a man
before. Upon this, I immediately threw my
body, arms, and legs, into all kinds of antic
movements, grumbling loudly at the same time ;
and the whole herd, bulls, cows, and calves,
took off, as fast as ever they could pelt, leaving
me to return sound and whole to the inn, with
a hearty laugh against the Italians.

After I had seen the ram of Apulia in
Naples, I no longer considered Homer's story
of Ulysses with the sheep of Polyphemus so
very much out of the way.

The days passed swiftly over in Naples.
A^Tiat with our visits to the wonderful places in
the neighbourhood, and the interesting sights in
" otiosa Neapolis" itself, we could sfcarcely be-
lieve that the 19th of September had actually
dawned upon us. On this day is celebrated the
festival of St. Januarius, bishop and martyr; and
we had come from Rome to Naples expressly to

Ixxviii AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF

witness the liquefaction of his blood. I will not
trouble the reader with any preliminary remarks
on this astonishing prodigy, but merely observe
that Sir William Hamilton, our former am-
bassador at Naples, wrote to Lord Morton, the
President of the Royal Society, on the 29th of
December, in 1767, in the following words : —
" It is well attested here that the eruption of
Vesuvius ceased the moment St. Januarius's
head came in sight of the mountain."

We had the very best letters of introduction to
Naples ; so that these procured for us most con-
venient situations to witness whatever might take
place. On the 19th of September, then, in the
year 1840, accompanied by my two sisters-
in-law, Miss Edmonstone and Miss Helen Ed-
monstone, and my little boy, we arrived at the
Cathedral, and entered it just as the great clock
was striking a quarter past eight of the morning.
Through the kindness of Father Sorentino, of the
Society of Jesus, and through that of the learned
Abb(5 Bianchi, we were shown into most advan-
tageous places.

A short time before the phial which contains
the blood of St. Januarius was taken out of the
chapel dedicated to him, in order to be placed

CHARLES WATERTON, ESQ. Ixxix

upon the high altar in the cathedral, all the
people joined in repeating the Litany of the
blessed Virgin, and in reciting aloud several
other prayers. When these were finished, the
silver bust of the saint vv^as taken from the
chapel in solemn and imposing procession, and
was put upon the high altar. High Mass was
then performed, whilst the entire cathedral was
densely filled with people. At the termination
of High Mass, the phial containing the blood
was carried by one of the canons into the body
of the cathedral, in order that every person
present might have an opportunity of inspecting
the blood and of kissing the phial, should he
feel inclined to do so. There were two phials,
a large one containing the blood as it had flowed
from the woimds of the martyr at his execution,
and a smaller one containing his blood mixed
with sand, just as it had been taken from the
ground on which it had fallen. These two
phials were enclosed in a very strong and beau-
tifully ornamented case of silver and glass. I
kissed this case, and had a most satisfactory
opportunity of seeing the blood in its solid state.
Thousands of people, in all ranks of life, from
the prince to the beggar, had the same oppor-

IXXX AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF

tunity with myself of witnessing the blood in its
solid state ; and the canon who held the case
as I was looking most intently at it, turned it
over and over many times, to prove to us that
the blood was not liquid ; and as he did this,
he only touched the case with the extremities
of his fingers.

I ought to have mentioned above, that so
soon as High Mass had terminated, a number
of females were admitted into the sanctuary.
This was a kind of hereditary right, claimed
and possessed by their families time out of mind,
on account of their connection with that of
St. Januarius. These privileged women recited
aloud the Litany of the blessed Virgin ; and
they sent up other fervent prayers to Heaven,
accompanied with the most extraordinary ges-
ticulations that can possibly be conceived.
Strangers who know little or nothing of the
Italian language, and who do not enter into the
fervour occasioned by a scene like this, have
sometimes taken it into their heads that these
females are actually abusing the saint for not
allowing his blood to liquefy so soon as they
could wish. But this is a false surmise on their
part. I was close to the females at the time

CHARLES WATERTON, ESQ. Ixxxi

that they were praying most fervently, and I
heard neither threat nor abuse ; all appeared
excessive devotional fervour on their parts.

At one o'clock, p. M. by my watch, no symp-
toms whatever of a change in the blood had
occurred. A vast number of people had al-
ready left the cathedral, so that I found the
temperature of the place considerably lowered.

Precisely at a quarter before two in the
afternoon the blood suddenly and entirel_y
liquefied. The canon who held the case passed
close by me, and afforded me a most favourable
opportunity of accompanying him close up to the
high altar, where I kissed the phial, and joined
my humble prayers to those of the multitude
who were blessing and praising Almighty God
for this signal mark of his favour in the stu-
pendous miracle which had just taken place,

I kissed the phial again an hour after this,
and again at the expiration of another hour,
and so on, making in all five times, an hour
always intervening betwixt each devotional salu-
tation. By means of these repeated inspections
of the blood, I saw that it remained in it^
liquid state without any apparent tendency to
congelation, although the temperature of the

Ixxxii AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF

cathedral had abated much by five o'clock in
the evening, at which hour I kissed the phial
for the last time that day. I had been in the
cathedral for more than eight hours without
once leaving it ; and I had watched with in-
tense interest every thing that had taken place
on the occasion. This was on the 19th of
September ; and on the 23d of the same month
I visited the cathedral again, betwixt the hours
of nine and ten in the morning, just after
high mass had been performed at the altar in
the chapel of St. Januarius. I examined the
blood most minutely ; it formed one solid lump,
and was quite immovable, as the canon turned
the reliquary up and down and sideways before
my face. There was no favour shown. The
poorest man in the cathedral had an equal op-
portunity of approaching the relic, and of in-
specting it, with the Queen Dowager herself,
who was there. The blood liquefied a few
minutes before ten o'clock, and I examined it
repeatedly in its liquid state with the same
attention which I had shown to it in the after-
noon of the 19th.

Nothing in the whole course of my life has
struck me so forcibly as this occurrence. Every

CHARLES WATERTON, ESQ. Ixxxiii

thing else in the shape of adventures now
appears to me to be trivial and of no amount.
I here state, in the most unqualified manner,
my firm conviction that the liquefaction of the
blood of St. Januarius is miraculous beyond the
shadow of a doubt. Were I to conceal this my
conviction, from the public eye, I should ques-
tion the soundness of both my head and heart,
and charge my pen with arrant cowardice.

During our sojourn in gay, but noisy Naples,
we had an adventure, as absurd as it was unex-
pected ; and it was so mixed up with affected
cleanliness, attempted extortion, and natural
history, that I cannot refrain from giving a
short description of it.

I had a letter of introduction to the supe-
rior at the beautiful convent of San Martino,
situated on the lofty hill where stands St. Elmo's
stately fortress. One afternoon, whilst we were
enjoying a drive up to this well-guarded citadel,
I took the opportunity of delivering my letter
of introduction to the convent ; and, as ladies
are forbidden by the law to enter such esta-
blishments, it was arranged betwixt us that
they should continue their drive to the gates of
the fort, and saunter there until my return

Ixxxiv AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF

from the monastery. It seems that the son of
Bellona, who commands at the fort of St. Elmo,
has his organs of sight and smell so particularly
refined, that he cannot tolerate the least im-
purity on the road that leads to his domain ;
and thus every coachman is obliged to remove,
vvdthout delay, what may drop accidentally from
the caudal extremity of his horses, or pay a fine
to a soldier for doing the important work for
him.

When I had inspected the convent, and en-
joyed the magnificent view from its corridors, I
joined the ladies ; and to my surprise I found
them and our Roman coachman, and the coach
itself, and the horses, all under military arrest.
The coachman was in a prodigious fury with
the sentinel, and the sentinel was loud in his
demand for work accomplished.

" By the Pope," said our coachman, " I wo'n't
pay a single baiocco."

*' You shall pay in full," said the irritated
sentinel, " or I'll keep you all here till morn-
ing."

" What is there to do, Pasquale ? " said I.

" Signore," said he, " they have falsely ac-
cused my horses of uncleanliness, and they want

CHARLES WATERTON, ESQ. IxxXV

me to pay the soldier for removing the pretended
nuisance. Now, I will do no such thing," con-
tinued he, •' for my horses non sono andati di
corpo, have not had one single motion, this
afternoon, from the time that they left the
stable ; and the young ladies who are sitting
there in the carriage can bear witness to the
truth of what I affirm."

" Your horses have committed the offence,"
said a soldier standing close to the sentinel, " for
I myself removed what fell, and put it over the
wall there, and I will be paid for my trouble."

" Not by me," said our coachman, wrath-
fully, whilst fire flashed from his coal-black
eyes.

" Pray, friend," said I to the soldier who
had just been speaking, " did you actually see
the horses commit the fault ? "

" No, Signore," said he ; " but I removed
what had dropped from them whilst it was still
warm, and there has been no other carriage on
the road to the fort this afternoon."

Now I saw clearly that I had the whip-hand
of these extortioners ; for, just as I left the
ladies in order to deliver my letter at the con-
vent, I observed a jackass going quietly on the
e 3

Ixxxvi AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF

road before us ; and it was evidently this un-
fortunate beast of burden which had been
under the necessity of breaking the rules of
the place. Wherefore, putting on a look of
ferocity, I told the sentinel sternly that nothing
should be paid, and that he might keep us
under arrest all night long, if he thought fit to
do so ; and then I ordered him peremptorily to
send for the officer on duty.

"Whilst we were thus hotly engaged, a hand-
some young officer made his appearance from
the fort, and, stepping up to the side of the
carriage, he begged to know the cause of the
uproar. We each of us told our story; and,
as the officer had no other clue to go by but
the asseverations of both parties, there was not
much appearance that things would go off" to
our satisfaction.

" The dispute can be settled in a minute,"
said I to the polite young officer, " if we repair
to the place where the soldier has deposited
what has caused our arrest. I have the greatest
confidence in the veracity of my coachman ;
and, moreover, as I am pretty well versed in
natural history, it will be no difficult task for
me to prove, by the size of the nuisance, that

CHARLES WATERTON, ESQ. Ixxxvii

our horses have been basely calumniated. Mon
officier" said I, " I saw a moderately sized
jackass, with my own eyes, trot along the road
before our carriage, just as I left it to go to the
convent ; and I am sure I shall be able to show,
by admeasurement of the component parts of
the guano, that the ass alone must have been
the sinner in this unexpected and unpleasant
affair."

The officer saw immediately that his soldier's
claim was groundless. He rebuked the sentinel
for having stopped the carriage, and then,
making a bow, with a look full of good-humour,
to the ladies, he requested that they would con-
tinue their drive. Pasquale moved onwards,
growling like a bear with a scalded head, and
declaring, as his horses started, that such an
act of tyranny as this was just fitted for Naples,
but never could have taken place at any fort in
the papal states, or in any other country.

Having fully succeeded in the object of our
visit to Naples, we took the advantage of a
fine steamer for Sicily, but not with any inten-
tion of Slaying there, as our projected return
to Rome would merely admit of a transient
visit to that renowned island. I had long

IxXXviii AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF

wished for an opportunity to see Scylla and
Charybdis ; the first, so notorious formerly for
the howling of her dogs under water, —

" Seylla rapax canibus, Siculo latrare proftindo ; "

the second, terrible for its hostiHty to sliips, —

" Ratibusque inimica Charybdis."

Stromboli's smoking crater, not unknown at
Guildhall in .the affair of Captain Booty, was
seen in the distance, as we were advancing to
these famous straits. But I was sadly disap-
pointed with their appearance, for they showed
nothing of that tremendous agitation so forcibly
described by the ancients. I concluded at last,
that either the poets had availed themselves of
the licence which has always been accorded to
those who drink the waters of Helicon, or that
these two ferocious whirlpool genii had left
their favourite residence and gone elsewhere.
Indeed, I soon found to my cost that they had
settled in the passport offices of Sicily, for I was
all but worried alive there. The hungry inmates
had found a flaw in my Neapolitan passport. It
consisted merely of the omission of the word
" return." This was a windfall for their insatiate
cravings ; and I had either to administer to their

CHARLES WATERTON, ESQ. Ixxxix

appetites, or to give up all thoughts of leaving
the island, as the negligence of the authorities
in Naples had subjected me to take out a new
passport in Sicily. Thus I had first to pay at
one office and then at another ; to wait here,
and to expostulate there ; so that, what with
the heat of the sun, and the roughness of the
pavement, and the payment of fees, I could not
have been much worse off had I been sucked
into the vortex of the old straits themselves.
In a word, there was no helping myself, and no
mercy shown, although I cried out most feel-
ingly—

" Solvere quassatse parcite membra ratis."

The vexations at the passport offices deduct
considerably from the pleasure of a tom: through
the insular dominions of his Neapolitan majesty.

I can fancy that Sicily must afford a mag-
nificent treat to the votaries of ornithology
both early in April and at the close of Sep-
tember, as the European birds of passage, in
coming to the north, and in retiring from it,
are knovm to pass in great quantities through
this island. A person with a good telescope,
and in a favourable situation, would have it in
his power to mark down the many different

XC AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF

species of birds which wing their way to this
quarter ; and I can conceive that the family
of hawks, especially the windhover, would be
very numerous.

I got considerable information, concerning
the nautilus in the Sicilian seas from an excel-
lent gentleman who accompanied me in the
steamer, and to whom I had been introduced
in Naples the day before we sailed. His name
was Larkins, and he was a clergyman of the
Established Church. I shall long remember
his attentions to us in Messina. We corre-
sponded for some time after my return to Rome ;
but as he was much out of health, and did not
answer my last letter, I cannot divest myself of
the fear that he is now no more.

In Sicily we saw an exliibition, the recollec-
tion of which haunted me like a spectre for
many a week afterwards. It might be termed
a melancholy parade of death decked out in a
profusion of gay and splendid colours. I could
not comprehend by what species of philosophy
these islanders had brought themselves to the
contemplation of objects once so dear to them,
but now shrunk into hideous deformity, and
seeming, as it were, to ask for a removal from

CHARLES WATERTON, ESQ. XCl

a situation which ill befits them, and which has
robbed the grave of its just and long-acknow-
ledged perquisite. This abhorrent spectacle is
no other than that of the dead brought from
what ought to be their last resting-place, where
the dryness of the climate has preserved their
flesh from rotting. They were decked out in
magnificent attire ; but death had slain their
beauty ; their godlike form was gone, and the
worm had left upon them disgusting traces of
its ravages.

" Matres, atque viri, defunctaque corpora vita."

We saw what once had been fine young
ladies, and elderly matrons, and fathers of
families, in dresses fit for a convivial dance ;
and we might have imagined that they were
enjoying an hour of repose till the arrival of the
festive time. But when our eyes caught the
parts not veiled by the gorgeous raiment, oh.
Heavens ! there, indeed, appeared death in all
his grisly terrors. I had never seen any sight
in my life, before this, so incongruous, so mourn-
ful, so dismal, and so horrifying. These shrunk
and withered remnants of former bloom and
beauty brought to my mind the exhibitions of
stufied monkeys which we see in our own

XCU AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF

museums, with this difference only, that the
monkeys have glass eyes most unnaturally
starting from their sockets, whilst the hollow
sockets of the Sicilian mummies contain a
withered substance, discoloured and deprived
of all the loveliness that life had once imparted
to it.

The churches in this delicious island surpass
even those of Rome in the variety of rare and
costly marble ornaments.

The horns of the cattle are of surprising
length. By the merest mishap in the world, I
lost the opportunity of purchasing a pair of
these, which would have deserved a place of
distinction in any museum of England.

We left Sicily under the fall impression that
we ought to have remained there for three or four
months ; but this could not be accomplished ;
so, on our return to Naples, having paid a fare-
well visit to Virgil's tomb, we left this laughing,
noisy, merry city on a fine and sunny morning,
to enjoy, for eight or nine months more, the
soothing quiet of the Roman capital.

To ourselves, as Catholics, a prolonged so-
journ in the eternal city was of infinite value.
The venerable Cardinal Fransoni had been un-

CHARLES WATERTONj ESQ. XClll

remitting in his attentions to us ; whilst his pious
secretary, il Signore Canonico Natanaele Fucili,
showed a friendship for us as though our ac-
quaintance had been of very long standing. My
little boy was so fond of this amiable gentleman,
and so devoted to His Eminence, that he would
be in the Propaganda whenever an opportunity
offered. The friendly offices, too, of Dr. Wise-
man and Dr. Baggs, of the English College,
added much to our-enjoyment.

But the church of the Gesii was the chief
place of our daily resort. My little boy might
be said to have lived in the convent. Its pro-
fessed fathers and its lay brothers were un-
bounded in their acts of friendship to him, and
in imparting to him instructions the most in-
valuable and important at his tender time of
life. The " English angelino," as these good
religious called him, never appeared to such
advantage as when engaged in the sacred cere-
monies at the church of the Jesuits. The
decorum which is punctually observed in this
splendid edifice renders it a place of universal
resort, whilst the punctuahty in the daily per-
formance of divine service is beyond all praise.
The doors are opened precisely at five o'clock

XCIV AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF

of every morning in the year, but many masses
are said before that hour.

One Sunday, during the celebration of high
mass, when this church was densely crowded.
Miss Edmonstone had to witness a most ap-
palling accident, very near to the place where
she was kneeling. A man who was in the habit
of lighting the uppermost candles which orna-
ment the lofty cornice, had been ordered to
discontinue his services on account of a dizzi-
ness which had recently attacked him. Not-
withstanding this injunction, he had the temerity
to ascend that very morning, and down he
came into the body of the church, mortally
wounded himself, and mortally wounding a
poor old woman, who was in fervent prayer
upon her knees below. They both died in the
course of the week.

I would often in the morning, whilst waiting
for the opening of the church doors, ask some
of the good souls assembled there, what it was
that made the Jesuits such universal favourites
with the people. I invariably received for
answer that, although the other religious orders
were very good and attentive to them, yet the
fervour, and charity, and attendance, of these

CHARLES WATERTON, ESQ. XCV

fathers were carried to a still higher degree ; and
that, during the cholera, their exertions were
beyond all praise, for they were seen in the
most infected parts of the city, both day and
night, performing acts of charity and piety in
every shape imaginable.

As casual conversation is more easily entered
into by the light of the moon or the lamp, than
under the broad face of day, I was ever and
anon exchanging words with those who were
wont to assemble at the porch of the Gesu ere
the morning light had dawned. A person in
very comfortable circumstances, if I might judge
by the neat appearance of his raiment, and ap-
parently not far from eighty years of age, would
often be pacing to and fro in front of the
church full half an hour before the doors were
opened. One morning I thought I would ask
him if he had ever seen Benedict Joseph Labre,
the unknown and humble beggar who had died
at Rome in the odour of sanctity, on the 16th
of April 1783. He told me that he had often
observed this pattern of humility and self-denial
both in the streets and in the churches ; but that
he had never conversed with Benedict, for that
this poor follower of Jesus Christ was never seen

XCVl AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF

loitering in the streets through which he passed
from one church to another, where he spent
nearly the whole of the day, either standing in
profound recollection, or on his knees absorbed
in prayer. He added, that he saw all Rome in
motion on the day in which Benedict died, and
that on the following days, all ranks of people,
from the highest to the lowest, were incessantly
flocking to the church of Santa Maria dei Monti,
where the body lay, in order that they might have
an opportunity of showing their respect for it.
Benedict was a Frenchman, born of very
respectable parents in the diocese of Boulogne-
sur-Mer. His family knew not that he existed,
having lost all trace of him from the time that
he wrote his last letter to them on his way to
Rome, where he passed the remainder of his
life, a voluntary beggar, unknown and un-
noticed, in the exercise of every Christian
virtue. He lies buried on the epistle side of
the high altar in the church of Santa Maria dei
Monti, with a slab of white marble over his
grave, mentioning his name, and age, and death,
and the day of his interment. Benedict will
probably be canonised ere long, as the process
of his beatification has already commenced.

CHARLES WATERTON, ESQ. XCVll

On festival days, the superb temple of the
Gesu is ornamented in splendid style with a
vast profusion of very rich gold fringe which
hangs at the cornice throughout its whole ex-
tent. The preservation of this costly treasure
from the hands of plunder on a former occasion
was so unique that I cannot help relating the
circumstance, if I can do so without trenching
on the very nervous sensibiKty of modern
decorum. I will try my best.

When the French had got to Rome, and
were making professions on all sides of Frater-
nite, Egalite, and Liberte, the Romans found
out too. late that these were merely words used
as a cloak to conceal depravity in its worst of
forms. A rumour had got abroad that these
newly arrived Gallic brothers had expressed
their astonishment at the prodigious show of gold
fringe in the celebrated church of the Gesu. This
caused the good fathers to turn pale, for they
clearly foresaw that they were to be honoured
by a visit on the part of those whose swords
had hitherto generally been employed as chief
agents in adjusting affairs of meum et tuum.
To attempt a concealment of the treasure within
their walls would be futile, as their scrutinising
f

XCVUl AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF

visiters were known to have the eyes of lynxes.
To send it out would be running fully an equal
risk. In this uncertainty the good lay brother
who had charge of the fringe requested leave
that he might try to save it ; and his plan was
such as would have done honour to the brains
of Annibal himself.

Having collected the immense mass of golden
fringe, he threw it negligently into an unfre-
quented room, and covered it with a heap of
bedclothes ready for the washing- tub. He
then went into the street with a couple of
buckets in his hands ; and having procured
enough of what in London would never be
found exposed to the open air, he conveyed it
to the unoccupied apartment mentioned above,
where he had already taken the precaution to
place a certain number of nocturnal crockery
conveniences. Into these he discharged from his
buckets a fair proportion of bis imported guano.
He then shut the window, and having closed
the door without locking it, he returned to the
performance of his ordinary occupations. In a
day or two a detachment of French troops paid
their visit to the Gesii, and were so taken
with the appearance of it, that they expressed

CHARLES WATERTON, ESQ. XCIJ

a wish to see through the different parts of the
enclosvtre. The door of the room in question
was opened by one of their perambulating
companions. In an instant out rushed the in-
carcerated vapours, " qua data porta ruunt ; "
and, what with the sight and the odour together,
the visiters deemed it time to retreat, disgusted
with the filthiness of a convent where they had
hoped to reap a golden harvest.

Formerly the church of the Jesuits possessed
many fine paintings by masters of the first ce-
lebrity, but barbarity and injustice deprived the
fathers of these inestimable treasures. The
cause of their disappearance from the corridors
of the Gesu does honour to the heart of man.
They were sold for the maintenance of the aged
Portuguese and Spanish missioners who had
been most cruelly deprived of every means of
support, and driven into exile, by D'Aranda
and Pombal, the infidel tools of the infidel
philosophers, who had it all their own way at
that eventful period.

From the time of our return to Rome to that
of our departure for Civita Vecchia in June
1841. things went smoothly on, whilst every-
day was productive of information and con-
f 2

C AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF

tentment. My sisters passed their- lime as
usual, and much of mine own was spent in the
bird-market and in its environs, and in preparing
the specimens which I had procured. I ob-
tained a fine gobbo, or white-headed duck, the
only one in the market during the two seasons
of my stay in Rome. I also got a very handsome
red-crested duck with a red beak, equally as
scarce.

The large bat, " altivolans," is abundant in
Rome. You may see it issuing from the lofty
edifices at sunset, and proceeding with sur-
prising velocity to its favourite haunts afar ofi*.
The Roman lizard is beautiful in form and
colour. After dissection, which is very difiicult
and tedious at the tail, I could restore its an-
atomy perfectly ; but the brilliant green and
yellow colours of its body soon began to fade,
and at last they totally disappeared, the spe-
cimen gradually assuming a tint composed of
grey and blue. The fresh-water tortoise, with
a tail considerably longer than that of the one
which lives on land, is well worth the trouble
of dissection.

Rome seems to have vast attractions for the
Entjlish nation. Protestants as well as Catholics

CHARLES WATERTON, ESQ. CI

flock to it in multitudes, and apparently pass
the winter season there with considerable satis-
faction. But we Catholics have opportunities of
seeing things which I fancy will never be acces-
sible to our dissenting brethren, so long as they
exhibit such want of decorum during their visits
to the sacred temples. Would that they could
be convinced how much they lose by conduct
so unworthy of those who bear the name of
Christian ! Certainly great allowances must be
made ; and I am wilKng to believe that the
scandalous deportment of many, may be at-
tributed more to early prejudice than to abso-
lute impiety ; for who is there amongst them,
of fifty years' standing, who has not been cau-
tioned times out of number against the devil,
the pope, and the pretender ? and although
they are informed by history that the last of
this redoubtable trio is dead, and cannot rise
again to claim his' stolen crown, still they are
aware that the remaining two are yet on earth.
The devil, however, if we may judge by the
frightful increase of magistrates and prisons in
England, has no spare time to be in Rome ;
but the pope is always there ; and the firm
belief of the misinformed English visiters that
f 3

Cll AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF

this kindest and best of pontiffs is really the
man of sin, who gets drunk on the blood of
nations, may have a wonderful effect in pro-
ducing that bad behaviour so notorious during
the performance of the annual ceremonies.
Indeed, when I reflect on the horrible wicked-
ness of England's coronation oath, I cannot
bring my mind to be hard upon those of our
own nation who conduct themselves so unbe-
comingly, and distract us so seriously during
the celebration of the adorable sacrifice of the
Mass,

If English Protestants, so amiable in society,
so well informed on most subjects except the
religion of their ancestors, and who are known
to be so charitable to people in distress, would
place less confidence in the fanatical ravings of
hired declaimers, and determine to procure in-
struction from a purer source, their mode of
conduct in our churches would improve, in
proportion as the knowledge of the real state of
things brought salutary conviction to their
minds. How many a lovely face have I seen
disfigured by a sarcastic smile at the very foot
of the altar ! How many a profane remark has
caught my ear from the mouths of passing

CHARLES WATERTON, ESQ. Clll

strangers whilst we were all in silent adoration
on bended knees before the real presence in
the consecrated host !

I may here observe that British families, on
their arrival in Italy, cannot be too cautious
in the selection of what is called " Laquais de
place," or man to show the curiosities. Too
many of these gentry are first-rate scamps,
with information ready concocted to suit the
tempers of those who hire them. Rome and
Venice, and Florence and Naples, abound in
these characters. A murder as old as the
hills, dressed up anew ; a sacerdotal intrigue
which never took place ; barbarous conventual
cruelties, such as those which Maria Monk has
manufactured, are topics which these accom-
modating renegades expatiate upon, according
to circumstances. Half of the calumnies against
our faith, from the pens of English people
abroad, have their origin in this polluted source.
The last time I was in Florence, whilst we were
viewing with our guide the upper outworks of
its magnificent cathedral, the fellow overshot
the mark, sadly to his loss. In pointing to the
localities of the former convents, he remarked
that their suppression was a benefit. " They

CIV AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF

ought never to appear again," said he ; " tlie
tow^n is much better without them." I let him
go on for a while, after which I informed him
that I had been educated by a religious order.
All was changed in a moment : his countenance
sank ; he begged a thousand pardons ; he
thought he had been with English Protestants.
And once, when I was in Venice, a sleek, well-
dressed wretch of this description came up, just
as I was passing over one of the bridges leading
to the square of St. Mark. It was nearly dark,
and he whispered in my ear, that he had got
something good in store. " Bestia infernale,"
said I, " is this thy work on a Sunday after-
noon ? " Away he ran, and I pursued him over
another bridge, where I lost him. My friend
Captain Alexander of the navy, will remember
this adventiu*e.

The Museum of Natural History at the
Sapienza in Rome, is a discredit to the name
of the establishment, and I could see nothing in
the department of zoology worthy of the least
attention. The gentleman who showed me
through it was very polite, and well-informed,
but I have forgot his name. It went to the
bottom of the sea, with the rest of my papers.

CHARLES WATERTON, ESQ. CV

Rome is certainly the most quiet city I ever
visited. That foul play and stiletto experiments
do occasionally occur, is probable enough, when
we consider the extent of the city, and the vast
influx of strangers from all parts of the world.
Still I witnessed no desperate acts of violence.
Yet, methinks, I must have seen some, and
perhaps have felt them too, had they been of
ordinary occurrence, for I had occasion to be
in the streets every morning a little after four
o'clock. Sometimes a houseless dog, which had
secured its night's lodgings in the open air,
would snarl at me ; but, on my pretending to
take up a stone, it fled immediately. I saw
nothing in the shape of man to cause suspicion,
either when the moon shone brightly, or when
her light was partially supplied by the flicker-
ings of the distant lamp. But I had often
occasion to observe both men and women,
kneeHng in fervent prayer at the little oratories
so common in the streets, especially at that of
the " Madonna del Archetto," so well known in
the year 1796, knd so incessantly resorted to
since that interesting period.

I was not aware until chance put me up to
it, how careful the Roman government is in

CVl AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF

providing for the spiritual wants of the soul.
Having mistaken the hour of rising, I was in
the street at half-past three in the morning ;
and seeing a man with a gun in his hand, and
a couple of dogs by his side, I pushed up, in
order to have a word or two with him. On my
remarking that it was somewhat early to go in
quest of game, he replied that his chase lay a
good way off; and that he had just come from
the three o'clock mass, which is always said at
that hour for the accommodation of those who
indulge in the sports of the field.

He who has leisure on hand to examine into
the nature of religious establishments, cannot
help being convinced of their utility. In Rome
it is at once apparent. There, no man ever
need complain of the want of a meal, for he is
sure to find it at the charitable convent door,
where, every day in the year, food is distri-
buted to all who come for it. An English
gentleman, who had resided fifteen years in
Rome, once told me that he had never known
a single instance of any person dying through
want. It would be wrong in me to withhold
this small tribute of praise due to the monas-
teries, as I am thoroughly convinced of their

CHARLES WATERTON, ESQ. CVU

great benefit to all ranks of people. The time
of the inmates is spent either in salutary advice
at the confessional, or in offering up prayers for
the nation, or in attending at stated hours to
the wants of the poor and the distressed. The
good monks may be seen taking the fresh air
in the evening, for the preservation of their
health, in some favourite quarter of the town,
but they all retire to the convent before it is
dark; the " Ave Maria," or short form of
prayer to implore the intercession of the blessed
Virgin for the welfare of the city, announcing
that the time of returning within their en-
closures has already arrived.

There was a lay-brother from the convent of
San Pietro in Montorio', who often came to see
us. I do not recollect, in the course of my
travels, ever to have met a person more kind,
more affable, or more engaging, than this excel-
lent man. He had always some little treat of
choice fruit from the garden of his convent for
our acceptance. We did not hesitate to receive
it, seeing the frankness with which he offered
this small tribute of his regard for us. His name
was Fra Francesco ; and he esteemed us as much
as we esteemed him ; for when he heard of our

CVlll AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF

disastrous shipwreck lie burst into tears, and
fell upon his knees to thank Heaven for its
mercy in having spared our lives.

There are many things in Rome which offend
our English feelings, although the natives do
not seem to be at all affected by them. Thus
all the spouts send down torrents of water
from the eaves of the houses into the streets
below, inflicting a deluge on those who have
not learned the art of threading their way suc-
cessfully through the spaces which intervene
betwixt the descending torrents. Many a time
have I received on my shoulders this annoying
fall of water. The streets, too, are abominably
filthy with offensive matter, causing a nuisance
which would not be tolerated for a single day
in an English town ; and within the entrance
door of many of their dwellings there may be
seen a pool which loudly calls for the mop, if
the purity of ladies' flounces be an object worthy
of attention. Again ; the kitchens of these
Italians appear as though they had never once
been white-washed since the days of Ancient
Rome ; whilst their cooking utensils are, at
times, none of the most cleanly. A friend of
mine had ordered an omelet for supper. His

CHARLES WATERTON, ESQ. CIX

servant, on going accidentally into the kit-
chen, saw the cook preparing it in a kind of
thing which I dare not exactly describe. But
the reader will understand me when I inform
him that the filthy rascal, not having a proper
kitchen-pan at hand, had actually been up into
the bed-room for a substitute. Our English
maid, once expressing a wish for a culinary
utensil in order to pour some broth into it, the
Italian servant had one in her eye which would
just suit. She went and brought the brass
pan in which we regularly washed our feet.
But these, and others of a similar nature, are
mere trifles, when compared with the pleasure
which we enjoyed, and with the instruction
which was imparted to us during our long
residence in Rome.

At last, however, the tide set in against us.
It is a long lane that has no turning. Cervantes
has told us that that there is nothing certain
in this life ; " No hay cosa segura en esta
vida : " and that, where you least expect it,
up jumps the hare ; " Adonde menos se piensa,
se levanta la liebre." All this we found to be
very true, after our departure from Rome in

ex AUTOBIOGRAPHY OP

order to reach England before the close of
summer.

I had been above a year and a half in southern
Italy with my sisters-in-law Miss Edmonstone
and Miss Helen Edmonstone, and my son
Edmund, a youth of eleven years of age.

We left Rome with, our two servants on
the 16th of June, 1841 ; and the next day,
at four o'clock in the afternoon, we went on
board the Pollux steamer of two-hundred-horse
power, at Civita Vecchia, and shaped our course
for Leghorn. The weather was charmingly
serene ; scarcely a ripple could be perceived
upon old ocean's surface ; and when the night
set in, although there was no moon, the bril-
liancy of the stars made ample amends for her
non-appearance. I soon remarked a want of
nautical discipline on board the Pollux ; and ere
the sun went down, I had observed to a gentle-
man standing by me, that in all my life I had
never been on board of a vessel where unseaman-
like conduct was more apparent.

After making choice of a convenient part of
the deck, I laid me down in my travelling cloak
to pass the night there, having Mr. Macintosh's
life-preserver in my pocket. He had made me

CHARLES WATERTON, ESQ. CXI

a present of this preserver some twenty years
ago, and I have never gone to sea without it.
Contrary to their usual custom, my sisters pre-
ferred to sleep that night on deck on account
of the serenity of the weather ; and as our two
servants followed their example, none of our
party went below, for my son Edmund had
already chosen his spot of retirement near to
the place where I was reposing. We had the
great awning above us. It had been left ex-
panded apparently more through neglect than
with an intention to accommodate the pas-
sengers.

Suddenly, our sleep was broken by a tre-
mendous crash, which at first I took to be the
bursting of the boiler. But I was soon unde-
ceived ; for, on looking around, I saw a huge
steamer aboard of us, nearly amid-ships. It
proved to be the Monjibello, of 240 horse
power, from Leghorn to Civita Vecchia. She
had come into us a little abaft the paddle-
wheels, with such force that her cutwater had
actually penetrated into our after-cabin. In
all probability she would have cut us in two,
had not her bowsprit fortunately come in con-
tact with our funnel, which was smashed in

CXU AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF

pieces, and driven overboard by the shock. The
Pollux instantly became a wreck, with her parts
amid-ships stove in ; and it was evident that she
had but a very little time to float.

I found my family all around me ; and
having slipped on and inflated my life-preserver,
I entreated them to be cool and temperate, and
they all obeyed me most implicitly. My little
boy had gone down on his knees, and was
praying fervently to the blessed Virgin to take
us under her protection, whilst Miss Edmon-
stone kept crying out in a tone of deep anxiety,
" Oh, save the poor boy, and never mind me ! "

Sad and woeful was the scene around us.
The rush to get into the Monjibello, which,
thanks to Charles Bonaparte (Prince Canino)
was still alongside of us, caused unutterable
confusion. Some were pulled up on deck by the
passengers and crew of the Monjibello ; others
managed to get on board of her without help ;
and others ran to and fro, bereft of all self-
command ; whilst our damaged vessel herself
was sinking deeper and deeper every minute
into her watery grave.

Confiding in my valuable life-preserver, I
remained on board the Pollux till nearly all

CHARLES WATERTON, ESQ.

had left her. I had managed to keep pc
sion of my favourite travelling cloak, and should
have saved it ultimately, but for the following
misadventure. A fine young German woman,
with a child under her arm, and apparently
terrified out of her senses, seized fast hold of
me by her hand that was free, just as I was in
the act of trying to get into the Monjibello.
Her convulsive grasp held me so completely
fast, that I could neither advance nor retreat.
I begged of her in French for the love of God
to let go her hold, as we should both of us
inevitably perish. But she was unconscious of
what I said ; and with her mouth half open, and
with her eyes fixed steadfastly on me, she con-
tinued to grasp me close under the ribs, with
fearful desperation. T now abandoned my cloak
to its fate ; and then, having both hands free, I
succeeded in tearing myself from her grasp, and
got up the side of the Monjibello by means of
a rope which was hanging there.

We were all saved except one man. He
was a respectable ship-captain from Naples,
and was on his way to Leghorn, in order to
purchase a vessel. In talking over his death
the morning after, it was surmised that he had
g

CXIV AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF

all his money in gold sewed up in a belt around
his body, — a thing common in these countries ;
and to this might be attributed his untimely
end, for I heard one of the Monjibello sailors
say, that he had got hold of the captain's hand
after he had fallen into the sea, but that the
weight was too much for him ; and so the poor
captain sank to the bottom and perished there. •

Mr. Frederick Massey, first engineer on board
of the Pollux, performed an act of courage which
ought to be made known to the public. He had
effected his escape from the sinking vessel into
the Monjibello, but reflecting that the boiler of
the former might explode and cause additional
horrors, he went back to her, and eased the
safety-valve, at the time when the- engine-room
was filling fast with water. Having performed
this eminent service, the gallant fellow got safely
back again on board the Monjibello.

The two steamers were now at a short dis-
tance from each other. I kept a steadfast eye
on the shattered Pollux, knowing that her final
catastrophe must be close at hand. She went
down stern foremost, but she hesitated a while
in the act of sinking, as though unwilling to
disappear for ever. This momentary and unex-

CHARLES WATERTON, ESQ. CXV

pected pause gave us some hopes that she might
remain waterlogged ; and I said to a gentleman
standing by me, I do not despair of seeing her
at to-morrow's dawn. But she tarried only for
a few minutes. Her forepart then appeared to
rise up perpendicularly. She sank gradually
lower and lower. We saw her last light ex-
tinguished in the water ; and then all was still,
for there was no wind in the heavens ; and so
easy was her descent into the " chambers of the
deep," that it caused no apparent temporary
whirlpool on the place which she had just oc-
cupied. Thus foundered the Pollux steamer,
with all her goods and property on board. Not
a spar, not a plank, not a remnant of any thing
was left behind her. Many were of opinion
that she floated not more than ten minutes from
the time that she received her death blow;
others again conjectured that she remained a
short half hour : probably, some sixteen or
eighteen minutes will not be far from the
mark.

All our hopes of safety now depended upon
the Monjibello. But the worst was apprehended,
knowing that she herself must have received a
tremendous shock at the time that she ran the

CXVl AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF

Pollux on board. The general perturbation
was much increased by a sudden report that
the Monjibello was actually sinking, and a
demand was immediately made by the passen-
gers to be put on shore at the nearest point of
land.

Prince Canino (Charles Bonaparte) had come
passenger in the Monjibello from Leghorn ;
and his exertions to save us were beyond all
praise. The fatal collision had taken place
some five miles from the Island of Elba. The
prince immediately ofiered his services to go
to Portolongoni, in order to obtain permission
for us to land there. Indeed, under Heaven,
we already owed our lives to Prince Canino,
for when the Monjibello had backed out from
the wreck of the Pollux, and was in the act of
sheering off from alongside of us, he, with the
characteristic judgment of his uncle Napoleon
in the hour of need, ran to the helm, and,
knocking the steersman aside, took hold of it
himself, and placed the Monjibello in a situation
to enable us to pass on board of her from the
sinking Pollux. Had the prince not done this,
the loss of life would have been terrible, for
we had been deprived of our boat, three people

CHARLES WATERTON, ESQ. CXVU

having made off with it to save their own lives,
at the time when all was in confusion.

The prince having reached Portolongoni in
one of the Monjibello's boats, he begged permis-
sion of the officer in command that he might
be allowed to land. But all his entreaties were
of no avail. Nothing could mollify the man's
iron heart. He peremptorily refused the favour
which the prince had asked, adding, by way of
excuse for his diabolical conduct, that he was
bound to obey the law, which did not allow of
our landing under existing circumstances.
Finding all remonstrance of no avail, and seeing
that the heart of this savage was too obdurate
to be worked upon by any further recital of the
horrors of our situation. Prince Canino left
Portolongoni in disgust, and returned to the
Monjibello, where he announced to us, in terms
of high indignation, the utter failure of his
mission.

"We lay-to during the remainder of the night,
got up our steam at early dawn, and reached
the port of Leghorn, where we came to an
anchor. Here, again, Prince Canino was a
real benefactor to us. The wisemen of Leghorn
met in consultation, and gravely decreed that

CXVll) AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF

we must perform a quarantine of twenty days,
because we had no bill of health to show. Now
these Solons knew full well that the Monjibello
had left their own harbour, in due form, only
the evening before ; and they were told that
the people whom the Monjibello had received
on board, had equally left Civita Yecchia in
due form ; but that these people could not
possibly produce a bill of health, because that
bill of health was unfortunately at the bottom
of the sea in the foundered Pollux. Still the
collected wisdom of Leghorn insisted on the
performance of quarantine. The law ordained
it, and the dead letter of the law was to be
their only guide.

Prince Canino pleaded our cause with im-
common fervour. He informed them that we
had had nothing to eat that morning, as the
Monjibello had only taken provisions on board
to last till she reached Civita Vecchia. He
described the absolute state of nudity to which
many of the sufferers had been reduced,
he urged the total loss of our property, and
he described in feeling terms the bruises and
wounds which had been received at the col-
lision. In fine, he entreated his auditors to

CHARLES WATERTON, ESQ. CXIX

accompany him alongside of the Monjibello,
where they would see with tlieir own eyes the
sufferings which he had just described.

" quid facundia posset.

Re patuit."

The council of Leghorn relented, and gra-
ciously allowed us to go ashore, after we had
been kept for above two hours in suspense as to
our destiny.

We landed, in appearance something like
Falstaff's regiment. My ladies had lost their
bonnets, and I my hat. Others were without
stockings, coats, and shoes. I saw two worthy
priests standing on the deck of the Monjibello
with only one shoe each. I recommended them
to cast lots for a shoe, so that one of them at
least might walk comfortably up the uneven
streets of Leghorn. They smiled as I said this,
and no doubt they thought my levity out of
season.

A survey was immediately made on the
Monjibello, and on finding that she had not
suffered materially during the concussion, she
was pronounced to be sea-worthy.

Having lost our all, we determined to return
to Rome in the same vessel which had run us
g4

CXX AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF

down. Wherefore, after thanking Mrs. M'Bean
and her two excellent sons for their attention to
us during the day which we had spent in Leg-
horn, we went once more on board the Monji-
bello, repassed over the place where the Pollux
had sank for ever, and landed at Civita Vecchia,
whence we posted it to Rome.

At the Roman custom-house they knew
how to feel for those in distress. We had
purchased in Leghorn all the materials neces-
sary to replace our lost wardrobe ; these were
liable to a heavy duty in the Roman States, but
the officers of the customs let every ai'ticle pass
duty free, remarking at the same time, that
our forlorn situation demanded all the assistance
in their power. Neither would the Roman
police make any charge for the renewal of our
" carta di sicurezza ; " and on our leaving
Rome for England a second time, nothing was
demanded by any of the different consuls for
signing our passport ; imitating in this, the dis-
interestedness of Mr. Barton, the British consul
at Civita Vecchia, who refused to take his fee,
and was unwearied in his attention to lis the
day after our disaster. But, I must add, that
when I went to the English consul of Le2;horn

CHARLES WATERTON, ESQ. CXXl

for a new passport, he charged the full price
for it, verifying the old saying, " Quaerenda
pecunia primum est."

And now a word or two more on the dismal
scenes which took place at the collision, and
after our vessel had foundered.

In the hour of danger several of the crew of
the Pollux abandoned us to our fate, and saved
themselves by getting into the other vessel.
Our brave captain and his mate, in lieu of
keeping alternate watch on deck, were both
fast asleep in their berths below, when the
Monjibello ran on board of us. The captain
was so scared, that he forgot to put on his
trousers, and his shirt was his only covering
when he reached the Monjibello.

At the very time that our boat would have
been of the utmost service to us, I have already
mentioned that three persons got into it, and.
rowed away for the land. A gentleman, by
name Ai'mstrong, had a narrow escape. He
was struck and knocked down by the Monji-
bello as she entered us ; and he was kept where
he fell, by the falling fragments. He was
sadly wounded, and he only just extricated
himself in time to save his life.

CXXll AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF

A Spanish duchess, who was sleeping below
at the time of the accident, lost her senses com-
pletely. She persisted in remaining in bed,
and no entreaties could move her to leave it.
She was dragged upon deck by main force, and
taken into the Monjibello with nothing but her
shift on. She had not re-gained her self-pos-
session on the following day, for she hesitated
at the door of the hotel in Leghorn, and would
not pass the threshold until her attendants had
shown her that it would not give way under her
feet.

After we had got safe into the Monjibello,
and the terror had somewhat abated, I went
down into one of her cabins to see how things
were going on. At the farthest corner of it, I
saw, by the light of a lamp, a venerable looking
priest dripping wet, and apparently in much
pain. He informed me, that he had fallen into
the sea, and he believed that he had broken his
arm, for that his sufferings were almost intoler-
able. I ripped up his coat with my penknife, and
found his shoulder dislocated. With the help
of three young English engineers, I replaced
the bone in its socket, and then took off his wet
clothes, and gave them in charge to my servant,

CHARLES WATERTON, ESQ. CXXlll

that he might dry them in the following morn-
ing's sun. A good Samaritan, who was standing
by, furnished a shirt for him. Having made him
as comfortable as circumstances would permit,
I got him some water to drink, and promised
that I would be with him every now and then
to see that all was right.

The people took me for a surgeon, and they
requested that I would bleed the captain of the
late Pollux, for that he was apparently in a
dying state. This dastardly sansculotte was on
the floor in horrible despair, sighing, sobbing,
and heaving Kke a broken-winded horse. Having
felt his pulse, I recommended that he should
be taken on deck, and drenched well with sea-
water, adding that this would be a much safer
process than drawing his precious blood ; and
that a mouthful or two of salt water, with a
little fresh air, would tend to collect his scat-
tered senses.

The whole blame of this shipwreck must be
thrown on the captains and the mates of the
respective vessels. All four of these worthless
seamen were fast asleep at the time of the
accident, in lieu of attending to their duty.
Hence the total loss of the beautiful steamer

CXXIV AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF

Pollux, at the very time when the absence of
every thing that could retard her progress, or
cause alarm for her safety, made us siu-e of a
prosperous passage to Leghorn.

Our own individual losses were heavy. The
costly wardrobe of my sisters, the objects of
art which had been purchased in Rome, our
books, our writings, our money, our Palmerston
passport, and our letter of credit, — all went to
the bottom with the foundered steamer. Miss
Helen Edmonstone lost an ivory crucifix of
rare value. It had been sculptured by some
first-rate artist of the 15th century, and its loss
can never be replaced. My little boy was
deprived of a relic of great estimation. It con-
sisted of a corpo santo from the catacombs, and
was expected to be placed in our chapel. He
had received it as a present from the hands of
the learned and virtuous Cardinal Fransoni.

In most towns of Italy, a book lies on the
table of the hotel, for travellers to enter their
names, and in it they sometimes pen down a
remark or two. In passing through the town
of Novi, on our return to England, a book
of this description was presented to me by
the waiter. After entering our names, I gave

CHARLES WATERTON, ESQ. CXXV

the following brief account of our recent dis-
aster:—

The Pollux, once so fine,

No longer cleaves the wave,
For now she lies supine,

Deep in her wat'ry grave.

When she received her blow.

The captain and his mate
Were both asleep below,

Snoring in breechless state.

If I the power possess 'd,

I'd hang them by the neck,
As warning to the rest,

How they desert the deck.

Our treasures, and our clothes,

With all we had, were lost.
The shock that caused our woes

Took place on Elba's coast.

Cervantes, who had studied the rise and fall
of human affairs in all their different bearings,
exclaims on one occasion, " Thou art welcome.
Evil, if thou comest alone." Had my disasters
ended with the shipwreck, all would have soon
gone right again; for the soothing hand of
time seldom or ever fails to pour balm into the
wounds which we are exposed to receive. But
it pleased Almighty God not to stay the chas-

CXXVl AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF

tising rod, so justly due to me, for my many
transgressions against his divine law. A fever
attacked me, and although it yielded to strength
of constitution, it seemed to have sown the
seed of future ailment ; for in a few days after
its disappearance a thirst came on, as intense
as any I had experienced on the other side of
the tropic. This was an awful warning. A
dysentery at last made its appearance, and it
harassed me cruelly all the way through Italy
and the intervening countries to Ostend, at
which port I embarked for London, and thence
took steam to Walton Hall, where the disorder
visibly increased.

The time had now arrived wKen duty called
upon me to place my poor boy under other
tuition ; and sick as I was, I determined to
accompany him to the place selected for his
education.

Ere we set off, I put the Wanderings and
Essays into his hand, with short instructions
written by myself on a few blank pages in the
first. Perhaps the reader will not refuse to
cast his eye over them. I have nothing else to
show him, how much I love my darling hoy ;

CHARLES WATERTON, ESQ. CXXVll

and how deep an interest I take in his future
welfare.

A. M. D. G.

To MY DEAR Edmund.

Aspice vultus

Ecce meos. Utinamque oculos in pectora posses
Inserere, et patrias intus deprendere curas."

Ovid.

You are now, my dear boy, about to enter
into a college conducted by professors famed far
and near for their learning, for their sanctity,
and for their paternal care of those who are
intrusted to their charge. This college will
either be a paradise or a purgatory to you.
If you love God above all things, if you re-
vere your superiors, if you give good example
to your equals, and attend to your studies,
happy indeed will be your hours and your
days. But if, on the contrary, you neglect to
perform your duty to God and man, there will
then be no comfort for you, and you will be
annoyed by brambles and by thorns at every

CXXVm AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF

step as you advance along. Now is the accept-
able time. Never, never will you have such
an opportunity of acquiring that knowledge,
and those habits of virtue, which will infallibly
insure your superiority on this side of the
grave, and your salvation on the other.

Treat, then, with attention and with gra-
titude those good fathers who sacrifice their
own comfort to lead you safely through the
paths of innocence and knowledge. Should
any of your companions try to alienate your
affection from these superiors, by turning them
into ridicule, oh! my dear boy, listen not for
one moment to the observations of such heart-
less young fools. The youth who is in the
habit of scoffing at his superiors, vsdll never
rank amongst the generous and the brave,
when he shall enter into the world at large.
Should any boy offer you a forbidden book to
read, oh ! request him not to approach you
with a viper whose sting is mortal.

Never give an impertinent answer to any of
your superiors. Love them, and obey them to
the best of your power ; and they will most
amply repay you by their kindness to you,
and by their solicitude for your present and

CHARLES WATERTON, LbQ. CXXIX

your future welfare. The scholar who reveres
his superiors is sure to become well informed,
and to acquire a large stock of virtue ; but he
who takes a pleasure in thwarting them will
probably be a dunce whilst he remains in the
college, and become a vicious man after he
shall have taken his departure from it.

Sometimes there are certain youths who find
fault vnth every thing which their superiors
recommend to their notice. Turn a deaf ear
to the remarks of these empty-headed simple-
tons ; but treat them at the same time with
gentleness and charity, and try to persuade
them, by the progress which you yourself are
making in virtue and in learning, how much
they lose by running down the institutions of
the college, and how much you gain by up-
holding them.

Believe me, my dear boy, I would never
send you to Stonyhurst, were I not convinced,
beyond all manner of doubt, that you cannot
go to a better place for your education. I
have the very highest opinion of it, and I hope
that you will have the same. I am sorry that
you should be separated from me ; but your
welfare requires that we should part for a
h

CXXX AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF

while. In tlie meantime, you will find a parent
at every step in the good fathers of Stony-
hurst. O, love them then, my dear boy, and
never do any thing that may cause to their
hearts one single pang of sorrow for your sake,
or of regret, that they should have taken you
under their charge. You cannot show your
affection for them better than by observing, to
the best of your abilities, all the college rules.
Take St. Aloysius for your model. Pray to
this angelic servant of Jesus Christ with con-
fidence, and he will not fail to intercede for
you at the throne of Divine Grace.

In conclusion, let me advise you to be very
punctual at rising in the morning. Acquire
the habit of early rising when you are young,
and you will never lose it in after-life.

" Early to bed, and early to rise,
Makes a man healthy, wealthy, and wise."

So says Doctor Franklin. Take a part, with
spirit and good nature, in all the public games,
which are instituted by the college. Carefully
avoid particular friendships. They will injure
you whilst you are at college, and they will be
of no manner of use to you when you shall
have left it for good and all. Prepare your-

CHARLES WATERTON, ESQ. CXXXl

self with great assiduity to enter into the So-
dality of the Blessed Virgin ; and when you
shall have had the happiness to become a
member of it, make a resolution to say her
office every day, until it shall please God to
take you out of this world.

" Ave Regina Coelorum ;
Ave Domina Angelorum,
Salve Radix, salve Porta,
Ex qua mundo lux est orta."

Farewell, my dearest boy. I give you my
blessing; and I promise you that you shall
want for nothing, provided you perform your
duty : and you cannot fail to do so, if you love
and revere your superiors, and follow implicitly
the holy and excellent instructions which you
will receive at their hands.

I have one parting request to make to you.
Say a short prayer for me, once a day, to St.
Francis Xavier, the glorious apostle of the
Indies.

Farewell again, my dearest boy, and believe
me to remain, your ever affectionate father,

Charles Waterton.

Walton HaU, Sept. 6. 1841.

CXXXn AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF

On my return from Stonyhurst, the dysentery
continued its ravages upon my iron frame with
unabated fury. I now wrote to my invaluable
friend, the justly celebrated Doctor Hobson of
Leeds, and I explained to him how sadly all
was going on. He was soon at Walton Hall ;
but such was the invincible composure of his
countenance, that although my truly affection-
ate sisters-in-law and myself watched most
narrowly his every look, not a single chance
did he afford us by any unguarded change of
features, to judge what might be the probable
result of the alarming disorder.

The masterly arrangements of this renowned
physician, ably put into execution by our
worthy family surgeon, Mr. Bennett, at last
arrested the complaint. This took place in
September ; but an act of imprudence some
four or five months afterwards brought me
back to the state from which I had so happily
escaped. On one cold and frosty morning I
had occasion to cut away the shoots from
certain stumps of trees on the bank of a brook.
My foot betrayed me, and I slipped into the
water up to the middle. As this accident had
placed me in a more commodious position to

CHARLES WATERTOX, ESQ. CXXXIU

trim the brambles on the sides of the brook,
I remained in the water for upwards of an
hour. The dysentery appeared again, and
again Doctor Hobson triumphed.

In the summer following I had a request
from Mr. Bennett to accompany him to York,
on an urgent family affair. Whilst I was in
the Minster a shivering fit came on with such
severity that I could have fancied I had fallen
in with my old foe the tertian ague, so for-
midable in the unwholesome swamps of Guiana.
But it turned out to be the harbinger of a
third attack of dysentery, and a third time
Doctor Hobson proved his consummate know-
ledge by counteracting its advances. In fact
he not only arrested its progress, but beat it so
completely, that it never rallied. After tliis,
my strength returned apace, and I am now
in the finest state of health that any man
can possibly wish to enjoy. Thanks, under
Heaven, to the skill of my medical adviser
and to his accomplished lady, whose kind at-
tentions to me during the period in which life
and death were struggling for superiority, have
for ever rendered me her grateful and devoted
debtor.

CXXX-IV AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF

I have little or nothing more to add by way
of memoir, except that the severe attacks of
dysentery, and the former indispositions caused
by remaining in unwholesome climates, and by
exposure to the weather, seem to have made
no inroad into my constitution ; for, although
life's index points at sixty-two, I am a stranger
to all sexagenarian disabilities, and can mount
to the top of a tree with my wonted steadiness
and pleasure. As I am confident that I owe
this vigorous state of frame to a total abstinence
from all strong liquors, I would fain say a
parting word or two to my young reader on
this important subject.

If he is determined to walk through life's
chequered path with ease to himself, and with
satisfaction to those who take an interest in his
welfare, he will have every chance in his favour,
provided he makes a firm resolution never once
to run the risk of losing his reason through an
act of intemperance : for the preservation of
his reason will always insure to him the ful-
filment of his resolution, and his resolution
will seldom fail to crown his efibrts with suc-
cess. The position of an irrational ass, crop-
ping thistles on the village common, is infinitely

CHARLES WATERTON, ESQ. CXXXV

more enviable than that of a rational man
under the influence of excessive drinking. In-
stinct teaches the first to avoid the place of
danger, whilst intemperance drives the last
headlong into the midst of it. To me there
is no sight in civilised society more horribly
disgusting than that of a human being in a
state of intoxication. The good Jesuit, who,
six and forty years ago, advised me never to
allow strong liquors to approach my lips, con-
ferred a greater benefit on me than if he had
put the mines of Potosi at my immediate

I might fill a large volume with the account
of miseries and deaths which I could distinctly
trace to the pernicious practice of inebriety. I
have seen manly strength, and female beauty,
and old age itself, in ruins under the fatal
pressure of this degrading vice. The knave
thrives on the follies of the drunkard, and
whole families may trace the commencement
of their decay to the dire allurements of the
public-house. Father Mathew has done more
for Great Britain by his divine suit of Sobriety
versus Sot, than all her parliaments and
h 4

CXXXVl AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF

potentates put together, from the days of
Old Harry down to the present time.

If the reader be not ah-eady tired with a
biography little interesting to any but the
writer of it, I would solicit his attention to
a few remarks on our new mode of travelling.

Steam is now in general use, both on land
and water. It transports us with such velocity
from place to place, that we may actually fancy
ourselves in full possession of the long-wished-
for winffs of Daedalus.

" Geminas opifex libravit in alas

Ipse suum corpus."

Let us, however, always bear in mind, that
this far-famed aerial rover taught mischievous
movements to his child, — " damnosas erudit
artes ; " and that our own invention, if not
worked with consummate skill and prudence,
may burst asunder when we least expect it,
and leave us dead on the road, or, like Icarus
of old, to perish in the water.

When every hope of life has fled, how we
should hail with ecstasy the arrival of a potent
friend to save us ! This friend is Macintosh's

CHARLES WATERTON, ESQ. CXXXVll

life-preserver, one of the most safe and simple
assistants ever oflfered to man in his hour of
need. Its price is trivial, and its size so small,
that it will easily go into the pocket of a coat ;
and it can be inflated in less than half a minute.
I put mine on (a present long ago from the
late Mr. Macintosh himself) when our vessel
was in the act of foundering near the Isle of
Elba ; and thus I was enabled to act with great
coolness, for I knew it would prevent my sink-
ing. This inestimable little belt is admirably
manufactured by Messrs. Charles Macintosh
& Co., and sold at the establishment No. 58.
Charing Cross, London, for the small sum of
nine shillings. What lives are lost on rivers,
how many sink when close in shore, and all
for want of such a friend as this !

Fifty years ago umbrellas were uncommon
things. Now these useful protectors from the
rain are in the hands of every body, from the
duke to the delver ; and they are not considered
as encumbrances. Neither do walking-sticks
nor travelling-caps incommode us ; and, in
countries abroad, we perpetually see smokers
carrying their tobacco-pouches and half a dozen

AUTOBIOGRAFliY OF

long German pipes tied up together. Let us
then not despair of seeing the day arrive, when
parties in pleasure-boats, and travellers by
steam on the ocean, and those who bathe in
rivers, shall have a Macintosh round their
waists, uninflated till the time of danger : and,
without the shoulder-straps, which are not
essential to its success, the belt would merely
have the appearance of a sash; and it would
not be more inconvenient than that central
ligature in our mihtary uniforms. What a
treasure it would prove, when the cramp comes
on in bathing, or when the boat capsizes, or
when the steamer founders !

Although sudden gusts of wind from the
wooded hills render sailing extremely perilous
here inland, I have never any fears for my only
boy when he is in the boat with hoisted sail,
provided I see that Macintosh's life-preserver
is round his waist. Happen what may, I know
that he must always float in perfect safety.

And now a parting word on Natural His-
tory.

An extensive preserve for every kind of
British bird which may choose to take advan-

CHARLES WATERTON, ESQ. CXXXIX

tage of it, has afforded me excellent oppor-
tunities of making ornithological notes with
tolerable exactness, and the observations of
former years have occasionally been corrected
by others in after-times. Still I recommend
that what I have given to the public on the
nature of our birds should be received with a
certain degree of reservation, as their habits
are apt to vary in proportion as location varies.
Thus, the windhover, or kestril, at this place,
abstains from killing birds during its abode
amongst us ; but, after it has left us on the
approach of autumn, it is known to feed upon
them during the winter months, as Mr. Bury
has satisfactorily proved in the 17th number of
that clever and instructive periodical the Zoolo-
gist. The sea-gulls, which not unfrequently re-
sort to this inland sheet of water, pass the whole
of their time in procuring fish ; but I have
seen the same species, on our eastern coast, fol-
lovdng the farmer's plough, like rooks, in quest
of worms. Mr. Wighton's squirrels will con-
sume carnal food when in confinement, whilst
mine, in liberty, are never known to touch it ;
and, in Scotland, Sir William Jardine's barn-

Cxl AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF

owl is known to hoot ; but here, in Yorkshire,
this species of owl can do no such thing. I my-
self can eat boiled snails in southern Italy, but
I am not quite certain that I would dine on
them at Walton Hall, with a sirloin of roast
beef on the table before me. At sea, too, I
have eagerly consumed decayed biscuit, the
very sight of which would be abhorrent to
my eyes on the shelves of a baker's shop. In
a word, who knows but that the Hanoverian
rat, which is so voracious in this appetite-
creating climate of England, might be more
moderate in the country from which it origin-
ally came, were it happily endowed with
qualities wherewith to perform a periodical
migration across the water.

I have now been full thirty years in striving
to improve the defective mode of preserving
specimens for museums. The method which
I have invented (as I have observed elsewhere)
cannot be attained through the medium of in-
structions committed to paper. Nothing, in-
deed, short of personal demonstration on my
part, in a process of three weeks' duration,
will suffice ; but, as there is no probability that

CHARLES WATERTON, ESQ. cxli

I shall enter into such a course, I foresee that
this novel method will sink down into oblivion
with him who has produced it.

But it is time to say farewell, and to bid
adieu to Natural History, as far as the press
is concerned. I trust that the account of my
adventures will not disedify the reader, nor
cause a frown upon his face, which it has been
my ardent endeavour to brighten up vdth mer-
riment. In casting my mind's eye over the
two and sixty years of my existence, the time
appears like the falling of a leaf in autumn,
a mere " sunbeam on a winter's day, a passing
cloud in a tempestuous sky, " — sure monitors to
put us in mind, " that we are here now and
gone in a moment ! " I cannot divest myself
of fear, when I consider how little I have done
hitherto, and how much I might have done in
preparation for that eventful day, when

" Mors stupebit et Natura,
Cum resurget Creatura,
Judicanti responsura ; "

that truly awful day, in which a cup of cold
water, given to the thirsty, in the name of our

Cxlii AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF, ETC.

dear Redeemer, will be of infinitely more value
to us than all our multifarious labours to please
a captious and seductive world.

" Only the actions of the just

Smell sweet, and blossom in the dust."

Charles Waterton.

Walton HaU, May 26. 1844.

ESSAYS

NATURAL HISTOEY.

ESSAYS

ON

NATURAL HISTORY,

&c. &c.

•^1

FLOWER-GARDENS AND SONG BIRDS.

" Inutilesque falce ramos amputans,

Felicioris inserit." Horace.

With priming-knife, the useless branch he cuts,
And in its place a graft prolific puts.

How I prize the gardener ! He is Nature's
prirnest jeweller; and he has the power of
placing within our reach all that is nutritive,
and luscious, and lovely in the enchanting
domains of Flora and Pomonj^^ Without his
assistance, Nature would soon run out into
uncurbed luxuriance ; the flowery lawn would
disappear, and ere long the hemlock and -the

2 FLOWER-GARDENS

bramble, with a train of noxious attendants,
would lord it all around. To the industry,
then, of the gardener we are indebted for scenes
of rural beauty quite unparalleled ; and to his
science we owe the possession of every whole-
some fruit and root. In times too, now long
gone by, ere the ruthless Reformation smote
this land, the gardener's nomenclature was
truly Christian ; for scarcely a flower, or shrub,
or root was known, the name of which did not
tend to put us in mind of future happiness in
the realms of eternal bliss. Hence the
gardener is my friend ; and wherever I have
an opportunity of surveying lands which bear
marks of his interesting labours, I wish him
well from my heart, and I hope that he may
not fail to receive a remunerating return for
his many useful services to us.

Were I asked my opinion of a highly-culti-
vated English flower-garden, I should say that
it is the loveliest sight in rural nature ; and,
moreover, that if it afiorded me an opportunity
of listening to the song of birds, I should
pronounce it little short of absolute perfection.
But, in general, the charming melody of birds
is of rare occurrence in the modern flower-

AND SONG BIRDS. o

garden ; and I fear that any observations which
I may make on this head will not have suffi-
cient weight with them to attract attention to it
on the part of the horticulturist. Nevertheless
I will venture for once to offer a remark or
two on a subject which always interests me ;
and, if what I shall say does not meet with
general approbation, may I hope that my rea-
ders will give me credit for good intentions.
I wish not to appear dictatorial. A few brief
observations, penned down without the least
intention on my part to be considered in the
light of an innovator, will, I trust, not be
wholly lost.

To me, whom kind Providence has destined
to spend the best part of my time in the open
air, the song of birds is soothing beyond ex-
pression ; and whilst I am admiring the beauty
of the rising flowers around me, I know no
greater addition to my gratification than that
of listening to it. How enchanting is it to
inspect the early snowdrops, those " fair maids
of February," whilst the stormcock is pouring
forth his newly acquired notes from the top of
a neighbouring elm ! and how delightful it is
to hear ccck-iobin's carol on the thorn that

B 2

* FLOWER-GARDENS

affords a shelter to the humble primrose ! The
lily of the valley, too, sweet, lovely, lowly
daughter of May, how I gaze in ecstasy on its
virgin whiteness, whilst the stranger cuckoo's
note sounds through the dell, and insiires me
the return of warmer weather ! The chaffinch,
too, and the whitethroat, and the thrush, and
the blackbird, with pretty jenny-wren, and the
hedge-sparrow, all add charms inexpressible,
by their sweet voices, to the rising flowers of
the dale. And this brings me to another bird
not seen now in this country, but interesting
to us on account of the place which it occupies
in Holy Writ. Its history is but little known
to the world at large, and its identity is exposed
to be called in question, on account of the
name which it erroneously bears. The bird to
which I allude is the Passer solitarius ; in En-
glish, the solitary sparrow ; and in Italian, pas-
sera solitaria. Would my readers lend a patient
ear for a short time, they shall have both the
history and the true name of this bird placed in
a pi'oper light.

The royal psalmist, whilst bending down in
penitential pra J er before his offended Maker,
exclaims, " Vigilavi, et factus sum sicut passer

AND SONG BIRDS. 5

solitarius in tecto." " I have watched, and am
become as a sparrow all alone upon the house-
top." I have often wondered what bird this
could be ; knowing, by daily experience, that
it could not actually be the house-sparrow ;
for the house-sparrow is not solitary in its
habits. I despaired of being able to trace its
character satisfactorily, and I should probably
have long remained in ignorance of it, had I
not visited the southern parts of Europe.

My arrival in Rome let me at once into the
secret. The bird to which the repentant king
of Israel compared himself in the seven peni-
tential psalms is a real thrush in size, in shape,
in habits, and in song ; with this difference
from the rest of the tribe, that it is remarkable
throughout all the East for sitting solitary on
the habitations of man.

The first time I ever saw this lonely plaintive
songster was in going to hear mass in the mag-
nificent church of the Jesuits at Rome. The
dawn was just appearing, and the bird passed
over my head, in its transit from the roof of
the Palace Odescalchi to the belfry of the
Church of the Twelve Apostles, singing as it
fiew. I thouffht it had been the Italian black-

b FLOWER-GARDENS

bird, with notes somewhat different from those
of our own ; for its song was partly that of the
blackbird, and partly that of the storracock, but
not so loud as the last, nor so varied as the
first. I found out my mistake in due time ;
and, on seeing that the bird was the true soli-
tary tlirush, I paid particular attention to its
habits.

It is indeed a solitary bird, for it never asso-
ciates with any other, and only with its own
mate in breeding time ; and even then it is
often seen quite alone upon the house-top,
where it warbles in sweet and plaintive strains,
and continues its song as it moves in easy flight
from roof to roof. The traveller who is fond of
ornithology may often see tliis bird on the re-
mains of the Temple of Peace, and occasionally
in the Villa Borghese, but much more fre-
quently on the stupendous ruins of the Baths
of Caracalla, where it breeds in holes of the
walls, and always on the Colosseum, where it
likewise makes its nest ; and, in fine, at one
time or other of the day, on the tops of most
of the churches, monasteries, and convents,
within and v^dthout the walls of the eternal city.

It lays five eggs of a very pale blue. They

AND SONG BIRDS. 7

much resemble those of our starling. The
bird itself is blue, with black wings and tail ;
the blue of the body becoming lighter when
placed in different attitudes.

Whilst I lodged in the Palazzo di Gregorio,
this solitary songster had its nest in the roof of
the celebrated Propaganda, across the street
" dei due MaceUi," and only a few yards from
my window. I longed to get at it, but knowing
that the Romans would not understand my
scaling the walls of the Propaganda, in order
to propagate the history of the solitary thrush,'
and seeing, at the same time, that the hole
at which the bird entered was very difficult of
access, I deemed it most prudent to keep clear
of the Propaganda, and to try to procure the
nest from some other quarter.

The many promises which Roman sportsmen
had given me of a nest and eggs of the solitary
thrush having entirely failed, and I myself not
being able to go in quest of them, on account
of an attack of dysentery, which bore heavy on
me, I despaired of obtaining the object of my
wishes, and I should have left Italy without
either nest or eggs, had not the Rev. Mr. Cowie,
vice-president of the Scotch College in Rome,

& FLOWER-GARDENS AND SONG BIRDS.

exerted himself, as he had already often done, in
the cause of natural liistory. This learned and
worthy gentleman sent expressly for a nest to the
vineyard of his college. It was found in the roof
of the house, and had four eggs in it. The
lad who took it had succeeded in capturing the
female bird. Having examined the poor captive
as minutely as though I had been a custom-house
oiScer, I turned it loose into the world again,
and as it flew away I hoped it would have better
luck for the time to come. I sent the nest and
eggs to England by a different route from that
which I myself pursued^ Had I taken them
with me, they would have gone to the bottom
of the Mediterranean Sea, for, in the night of
the 16th of June, 1841, my sisters-in-law, Miss
Edmonstone and Miss Helen Edmonstone, my
little boy, my servants, and myself, were wrecked
off the Island of Elba. We had only fifteen
minutes to save our lives before the vessel
foundered, and we lost every thing except the
clothes on our backs.

The solitary thrush is seen in all the countries
of the East, up to Syria and Egypt, and pro-
bably much farther on. This bird is solitary
to the fullest extent of the word. It being an.

ON DESTROYING VERMIN. 9

assiduous frequenter of the habitations of man,
I cannot have a doubt but that it was the same
bird wliich King David saw on the house-top
before him, and to which he Hstened as it poured
forth its sweet and plaintive song. Moved by
its melody, and comparing its lonely habits with
his own, he exclaimed in the fulness of an
afflicted heart, " Vigilavi, et factus sum sicut
passer solitarius in tecto." " I have watched,
and am become as a thrush, all alone upon the
house-top."

ON DESTROYING VERMIN IN SMALL GAR-
DENS, AND ON RELATIVE MATTERS.

In reply to a letter from Mr. Loudon.

You say, " you will send to a gardener in the
country for a weasel." You must send for
two, male and female. A bachelor weasel, or
a spinster weasel, would not tarry four and
twenty hours in your garden. Either of them

10 ON DESTROYING VERMIN

would go a sweethearting, and would not
return.

You remark that your "hedgehogs soon
disappeared." No doubt : unless confined by
a wall, they would wander far away, and try to
get back to their old hamits. You request me
" to suggest some place of shelter for them,
to which they might have recourse when at-
tacked by the cats?" I cannot believe that
hedgehogs are ever attacked by cats. A garden,
well fenced by a wall high enough to keep
dogs out, is a capital place for hedgehogs.
But there ought always to be two, man and
wife.

Your " frogs and toads disappeared in a
very short time, notwithstanding a small cistern
of water which was open to them." They
would have preferred a pond or ditch. No
doubt they left you in search of more agreeable
situations.

" Were it not for the cats we should have
plenty of birds." Granted. Cats amongst
birds are like the devil amongst us ; they
go up and down seeking whom they may
devour. You must absolutely chase them
away for good and all, otherwise there will be

IN SMALL GARDENS. 11

no peace for your birds. A small quantity of
arsenic, about as much as the point of your
penknife will contain, rubbed into a bit of
meat either cooked or raw, will do their
business effectually.

" I have often thought of suggesting to the
Board of Woods and Forests the idea of
feeding the birds, or rather of putting down
the different kinds of food proper for the
different kinds of singing-birds, in Kensington
Gardens." This would not be necessary. All
our soft-billed summer birds of passage, and
those soft-biUed birds that remain with us the
year throughout, live on insects ; and insects
abound during the period when these birds are
in song. But if you could prevail upon the
Board to prevent idle boys from chasing them,
and gunners from killing them, and bird-mer-
chants from catching them, all would be right ;
and almost every bush and tree would have its
chorister.

" If you could give any hints as to the next
best quadruped to the weasel for keeping in
gardens, or, in fact, anything relative to keep-
ing down, insects, it would be of very great
use." — I know of no other quadruped. The

12 ON DESTROYING VERMIN

barn owl is a great consumer of slugs ; and the
lapvdng will clear a garden of worms. Our
singing-birds are the best for destroying soft-
winged insects. The windhover hawk is ex-
cellent for killing beetles, and also for con-
suming slugs and snails : cats dare not attack
him, wherefore he is very fit for a garden, and
is very easy to be obtained, I could send you
a dozen any season.

Were I now a writer in the Magazine of
Natural History, I would not agree with a
Master Charles Coward in his paper on " The
carnivorous Propensities of the Squirrel." (See
the Magazine for 1839, p. 311.) And so this
keen observer has found out at last, that
squirrels in confinement are occasionally carni-
vorous animals. Indeed! And so are my
hens in confinement : they will kill and swallow
a mouse in the twinkling of an eye, and a tame
parrot will perform the same feat. All our
granivorous birds in confinement will eat raw
and cooked meat. My black cat " Tom,"
which is fed and pampered by my sisters, will
often turn up his nose at a piece of good
roasted mutton, and immediately after will eat
greedily of dry bread. What would you

IN SMALL GARDENS. 13

think of me were I to write for you a paper
in which I would state that the cat is occasion-
ally an animal that is very fond of bread ?
You cannot judge of the real habits of an
animal when it is in captivity. The want of
exercise, the change of economy, the change
of food, and the change of habit altogether,
tend wofully to change the very nature of
the stomach, and cause it to accommodate
itself to aliment which it would never touch
in a wild state. We see people out of health
eating chalk ; and we see others again, who
spend their lives in sedentary employments,
loathing food which is very palatable to him
who passes the day in the open air. Thus,
the ploughman will bolt fat bacon by the
cubic inch, whilst the tender young milliner
will turn sick at the very taste of it. I myself
cannot bear melted butter ; but I can and do
often thrive, by preference, on a hard crust of
bread. Still this would not be the case with
one of your London aldermen, who would turn
up his nose at the gifts of Ceres, unless those
of Nimrod and Bacchus appeared on the same
festive board.

The squirrel, in the state of liberty, lives on

14 ON DESTROYING VERMIN.

nuts and seeds, and on the tender bark of the
lime tree, &c. : but rest assured that it never
touches flesh, or kills birds, or sucks eggs. The
shepherds of Wiltshire who have backed
Master Charles in his important discovery-
deserve a birch rod. These rural sinners, both
young and old, would swear that the moon
was made of Jones's lucifers, if you would give
them a quart of ale apiece. All my labourers
believe that the heron thrusts its legs through
the nest during incubation ; and they will all
tell you that the cuckoo becomes scabbed at
the close of summer. " As scabbed as a
cuckoo." This, by the way, comes from the
mottled appearance which the plumage of the
bird puts on at that time of the year. It is
caused by the growth of the adult feathers
amongst the chicken feathers. I pity the poor
squirrels from my heart. Our country squires
will now consign them over to the tender
mercy of their gamekeepers, and we shall hear
of squirrels shot by the dozen. The squirrel
is a most harmless animal, except in a nut
orchard, from which he ought to be expelled
without loss of time, as the damage which he
does there is incalculable ; but I would trust him

THE LITTLE ITALIAN OWL. 15

for ever in a butcher's shop, provided he were
allowed to go and take his breakfast and
dinner in the neighbouring woods. I can see
the squirrel here just now, living entirely on
the seeds of the cones of the spruce firs ; I can
see him in the very trees which contain nests
of ringdoves, thrushes, chaifinches, and black-
birds. Still the owners of these nests betray
no fears on his approach ; and he himself
shows no inclination for raw eggs, or for young
or old birds, whereon to make a meal.

THE CIVETTA, OR LITTLE ITALIAN OWL.*

This diminutive rover of the night is much
prized by the gardeners of Italy for its un-
common ability in destroying insects, snails,
slugs, reptiles, and mice. There is scarcely an
out-house in the gardens and vineyards of that
country which is not tenanted by the civetta.
It is often brought up tame from the nest ;

* See a correct description of this bird in the Ornitologin
Toscana, vol. i. p. 76., by Professor Paolo Savi.

16 THE CIVETTA,

and in the month of September is sold for a
dollar to sportsmen, who take it with them in
their excursions through the country, to look
for larks and other small birds. Perched on
the top of a pole, it attracts their notice and
draws them within the fatal range of gunshot
by its most singular gestures ; for, standing
bolt upright, it curtsies incessantly, with its
head somewhat incKned forwards, whilst it
keeps its eyes fixed on the approaching object.
This odd movement is peculiar to the civetta
alone. By it, the birds of the neighbourhood
are decoyed to their destruction. Hence its
value to the ranging sportsman. Often and
anon, as the inhabitants of Rome pass through
the bird-market at the Pantheon, they stop,
and look, and laugh at this pretty little captive
owl, whilst it is performing its ridiculous ges-
ticulations.

Its flesh is relished by the natives of Italy.
You may see the civetta, plucked and ready
trussed for the spit, on the same stall at which
hawks, crows, jackdaws, jays, magpies, hedge-
hogs, frogs, snails, and buzzards are offered for
sale to the passing conoscenti, who frequent
the bird-market in quest of carnal delicacies.

OR LITTLE ITALIAN OWL. 17

The inhabitants of this country are apparently
blessed with stomachs as keen and strong as
that of my old black friend Daddy Quasshi,
who could fatten on the grubs of hornets, and
on stinking fish. Indeed, it would appear from
what I have seen, that scarcely any thing which
has had life in it comes amiss to the Italians in
the way of food, except the Hanoverian rat,
for I could often see this voracious and needy
intruder lying dead in the streets, and trodden
under foot.

Thinking that the civetta would be pecu-
liarly useful to the British horticulturist, not,
by the way, in his kitchen, but in his kitchen-
garden, I determined to import a dozen of these
birds into our own country. And still, said I
to myself, the world will say it was a strange
whim in me, to have brought owls all the way
from Italy to England ; seeing that owls, ay
and hawks too, are by no means scarce in our
palaces, and in parliament, and on the magis-
terial benches. Be this as it may, I agreed
with a bird-vender in the market at the Pan-
theon for a dozen young civettas; -and, having
provided a commodious cage for the journey,
c

18 THE CIVETTA,

we left the Eternal City on the 20th of July,
1842, for the land that gave me birth.

At Genoa, the custom-house officers appeared
inclined to make me pay duty for my owls.
" Gentlemen," said I, " these birds are not
for traffic ; neither are they foreigners : they
are from your own dear country, la hellis-
sima Italia, and I have already strong reason
to beKeve that they are common in Genoa, so
that they can well be spared." The custom-
house officers smiled as I said this, and then
they graciously allowed me and my owls to
proceed to the hotel, without abstracting a
single farthing from my pocket.

We passed through the sunny regions of
Piedmont with delight, and over the snowy
summit of Mount St. Gothard without any
loss, and thence we proceeded northward,
through Lucerne to Basle. Here, Monsieur
Passavant, the banker, a wormwood-looking
money-monger, seemed determined that myself
and my owls, and the rest of my family, should
advance no farther. Having lost my letter of
credit in the late shipwreck, and there not
having been time, after my return to Rome
and my short stay there, to receive another

OR LITTLE ITALIAN OWL. 19

from London, I was furnished, by the bank of
Prince Torlonia, with a very warm and com-
plimentary letter of introduction to Passavant
of Basle, in case I might fall short of money
on my way home ; and Prince Canino (Charles
Bonaparte), whom I accidentally met in Genoa,
gave me another of the same tenour. But all
would not do. I only wanted 121., which,
with what I had by me, would have enabled
me to reach Cologne, where I could have got
any supply of money from the good landlord of
the Hotel du Rhin. Passavant, to whom I had
presented the two letters, and to whom I had
given a full account of the unfortunate ship-
wreck, could not possibly comprehend how I
could have the temerity to travel without a
regular letter of credit. I offered him my
draught on Denison of London. He refused
to take it. Would he accept my watch worth
forty guineas, in pledge, till my bill should be
honoured ? No. He looked at me, and then
at the letters, and then at me again ; and said
there was something equivocal in the one
from Prince Torlonia's bank. He would not
advance me a single sous. On making my
retiring bow, I told him that, as I was in the

aU THE CIVETTA,

habit of writing occasionally on natural history,
I would make honourable mention of his great
liberality in my next publication, and that, in
the meantime, I would send Torlonia a full
account of our interview. *

I should have stuck fast for money in Basle,
had not Lord Brougham's brother (William
Brougham, Esq.) luckily arrived in the town
that very day. He immediately advanced me
an ample supply.

All went well after this, until we reached
Aix-la-Chapelle. Here, an act of rashness on
my part caused a serious diminution in the
family. A long journey, and wet weather, had
tended to soil the plumage of the little owls ;
and I deemed it necessary, that they, as well
as their master, should have the benefit of a
warm bath. Five of them died of cold the
same night. A sixth got its thigh broke, I
don't know how ; and a seventh breathed its
last, without any previous symptoms of indis-
position, about a fortnight after we had arrived
at Walton Hall.

The remaining five have surmounted all ca-

* Prince Torlonia. on receiving my letter, made Passavant
smart severely for his conduct.

OR LITTLE ITALIAN OWL. 21

sualties, having been well taken care of for
eight months. On the 10th of May, in the
year of our Lord 1842, there being abundance
of snails, slugs, and beetles on the ground, I
released them from their long confinement.

Just opposite to the flower-garden, there is
a dense plantation of spruce fir trees. Under
these, at intervals, by way of greater security,
I placed the separated parts of two dozen newly
ikilled rabbits, as a temporary supply of food ;
and at 7 o'clock in the evening, the weather
being serene and warm, I opened the door of
the cage. The five owls stepped out to try
their fortunes in this wicked world. As they
retired into the adjacent thicket, I bade them
be of good heart ; and although the whole world
was now open to them, " where to choose their
place of residence," I said, if they would stop
in my park, I would be glad of their company ;
and would always be a friend and benefactor to
them.

22 POWERS OF VEGETATION.

THE POWERS OF VEGETATION.

In those good days of old, when there were no
corn-factors in England to counteract that part
of our Redeemer's prayer, " Give us this day
our. daily bread," by hoarding up vast stores
of grain, until mouldiness and vermin have
rendered it unfit for the use of man, there
stood at Walton Hall a water-mill, for the
interest of the proprietor and the good of the
country round. Time, the great annihilator of
all human inventions, saving taxation and the
national debt, laid this fabric low in ruins some
sixty years ago ; and nothing now remains to
show the place where it once stood except a
massive millstone, which measures full 17 ft.
in circumference. The ground where the mill
stood having been converted into meadow, this
stone lay there unnoticed and unknown (save
by the passing hay- maker) from the period of
the mill's dissolution to the autumn of the year
1813, when one of our nut-eating wild animals,
probably by way of a winter store, deposited a
few nuts under its protecting cover. In the

POWERS OF VEGETATION. 23

course of the following summer, a single nut
having escaped the teeth of the destroyer, sent
up its verdant shoot through the hole in the
centre of the procumbent millstone.

One day I pointed out this rising tree to a
gentleman who was standing by ; and I said,
" If this young plant escape destruction, some
time or other it will support the millstone, and
raise it from the ground." He seemed to doubt
this.

In order, however, that the plant might have
a fair chance of success, I directed that it
should be defended from accident and harm by
means of a wooden paling. Year after year it
increased in size and beauty ; and when its
expansion had entirely filled the hole in the
centre of the millstone, it gradually began to
raise up the millstone itself from the seat of its
long repose. This huge mass of stone is now 8
in. above the ground, and is entirely supported
by the stem of the nut tree, which has risen to
tlie height of 25 ft. and bears excellent fruit.

Strangers often inspect this original curiosity.
When I meet a visitor whose mild physiognomy
informs me that his soul is proof against the
stormy winds of politics, which nOw-a-days

!24 THUNDER STORM

set all the world in a ferment, I venture a
small attempt at pleasantry, and say, that I
never pass this tree and millstone without
thinking of poor old Mr. Bull, with a weight
of eight hundred millions of pounds round his
galled neck; — fruitful source of speculation
to a Machiavel, but of sorrow to a Washington.

THUNDER STORM AT WALTON HALL.

On the 1 0th of August, 1 842, during a terrible
storm of thunder and lightning, the poplar tree
depicted in the engraving prefixed to the first
series of these Essays was struck and sadly rent.
I had passed the day at Leeds with our cele-
brated Doctor Hobson. Having had an early
dinner I felt a great incHnation to get home,
and repeatedly requested that the carriage might
be brought to the door. To this the doctor
obstinately objected, but, finding me unceasing
in my entreaties, he at last consented, and off" we
drove. You must know that every body, rich

AT WALTON HALL. 25

and poor, has permission to fish at Walton Hall,
from the first of April till the first of October.
Having reached home, I saw that the thunder
storm was just going to burst over us ; the rain
having begun to fall. Seven of the fishermen
had collected under the poplar tree ; and on
seeing them there, I ran out of the house, and
warned them of their danger, and desired them
to repair, without loss of time, to the saddle-
room, where they would get shelter from the
impending storm ; forbidding them, at the same
time, to stay for a moment under any of the
large trees on their way thither, as the con-
sequences might be fatal to them. Scarcely
had they reached the saddle-room wheH the
lightning struck the poplar tree, and sent
fragments of it in all directions. It may well
be supposed that we were not long in thanking
God Almighty, on bended knee, for the escape
from death of those who had intended to
remain under the shelter of the poplar tree,
until the storm should have passed over.

My father brought it, a plantling, in his
pocket from a gentleman's house near Don-
caster, and planted it where it now stands,
the year in which he came of age. It has

26 THE ROLLER.

grown surprisingly, and is, perhaps, the largest
Lombardy poplar in this neighbourhood.
Amongst those who had taken shelter under its
foliage was a fine handsome recruiting sergeant.
He has been to fish again to-day ; and he told
me only an hour or so ago, that he had deter-
mined to wait under the tree until the storm
should have passed away ; adding, at the same
time, how grateful he was to Almighty God
for his preservation. He said he had only just
got into the saddle-room, when the thunder
storm burst over us.

THE ROLLER CALLED PICA MARINA IN
ITALY.

" I love to see the little goldfinch pluck
The groundsel's feather'd seed, and twit and twit ;
And then, in bower of apple blossoms perch'd.
Trim his gay suit, and pay us with a song.
I would not hold him prisoner for the world."

HURDIS.

I KNOW nothing in the environs of Rome half
so grand and charming as the ornamented
grounds of the beautiful villa Pamphili Doria,

THE ROLLER. 27

the gates of which are always opened to the
pubKc. A blessing be upon the head of its
princely owner, for this prized permission to
the world at large ! May his liberality never
suffer by the hand of wanton mischief, nor ever
be checked by the presence of a rude intruder !
Many a time, when fairly tired with the never-
ending scenes of painting and of sculpture with-
in the walls of the Eternal City, have I resorted
to this enchanting spot, here to enjoy an hour
or two of rural quiet, and of purer air : and,
could I have had a few British gardeners by
my side, the enjoyment would have been more
complete ; for gardeners in general are choice
observers ; to them

" Not a tree,

A plant, a leaf, a blossom, but contains
A folio volume. "

The marble fountains of Pamphili Doria, its
lofty trees, its waterfalls, its terraces, its shrubs
and flowers and wooded winding-paths, delight
the soul of man, and clearly prove what magic
scenes can be produced, when studied art goes
hand in hand with nature. The walk, canopied
by evergreens of ancient growth, and at the
end of which a distant view of St. Peter's co-

28 THE ROLLER.

lossal temple bursts upon the sight, has so
much truth and judgment in its plan, that I
question whether its parallel can be found in
the annals of horticultural design. When St.
Peter's dome is illuminated, whilst standing
under the wooded archway of this walk, you
may fancy yourself on the confines of Elysium.
As an additional charm to the beauties of
Pamphili Doria, the birds are here protected,
so that not one of them which comes within its
precincts is ever transported to the bird market
at the Pantheon in Rome, where individuals of
every species known in Italy, from the wren to
the raven, may be had, ready trussed for the
spit. I myself, in the course of the season,
have seen and examined the following list of
good things on the stalls, to regale natives and
foreigners in Rome.* Towards the close of

* Wild boars, roebucks, red deer, hares, rabbits, pheasants,
frogs, common partridges and two other species, quails, water
rails, godwits, snipes, woodcocks, dabchicks, coots, wild ducks,
wild geese, golden plovers, green plovers, sand-pipers, wigeons,
teal, gargany, brown-headed ducks, sheldrakes, tufted Grecian
ducks, green linnets, goldfinches, brown linnets, grosbeaks, land
tortoises, ringdoves, rock pigeons, fancy pigeons, wagtails,
robin redbreasts, common buntings, grey buntings, cirl buntings,
bluecap titmouse, oxeye titmouse, long-tailed titmouse, black-
cap titmouse, cole titmouse, blackcap sylvia, song thrush.

THE ROLLER. 29

April, the walks of Pamphili Doria resound
vvith the sweet notes of the nightingale both
day and night ; and, from February to mid-
July, the thrush and blackbird pour forth in-
cessant strains of melody.

There stands in this inclosure a magnificent

blackbird, blue thrush, jays, magpies, rooks, hooded crows,
hedge sparrows, hawks, siskins, common larks, black-throated
larks, titlarks, smaller larks, judcocks, land rails, combs from
the heads of cocks, fowl and turkey legs and feet, buzzards,
curlews, small stints, redwings, pochards, falcons, civetta owls,
whinchats, windhover hawks, kites, stone curlews, jackdaws,
shoveler ducks, gobbo ducks, hedgehogs, water hens, spotted
water hens, bitterns, mergansers, stormcocks, porcupines, foxes,
goats, kids, yellow wagtails, fieldfares, hooting owls, horned
owls, barn owls, wheatears, redstarts, three species, nightingales,
yellow-breasted chats, stonechats, brown-headed shrikes, com-
mon shrikes, little terns, gulls, Guinea fowls, goatsuckers,
eggs from the ovarium of all sizes, wind eggs, larger white
egret, common heron, turkeys, guts of turkeys and common
fowls, swifts, swallows, starlings, little bitterns, white-winged
bitterns, large bitterns, bullfinches, chaffinches, water tortoises,
turtle doves, water rails, shags, red-throated mergansers,
badgers, lesser spotted woodpeckers, smallest woodpeckers,
green woodpeckers, small white-throated mergansers, common
wrens, common gold-crested wrens, splendid-golden crested
■wrens, house sparrows, mountain sparrows, mountain sparrows
with yellow speck on the throat, olive-throated bunting, crested
grebes, Canary birds, hoopoes, rollers, bee-eaters, golden orioles.
Add to this list butcher's meat of all descriptions, and the
finest fruits and vegetables, and flowers.

N. B. If a man cannot get fat in this city at a very moderate
expense, it must be his own fault.

30 THE ROLLER.

grove of stone pines, vast in their dimensions,
and towering in their height. Here the harm-
less jackdaw nestles, here the hooded crow is
seen, here the starling breeds in numbers, and
here the roller, decked in all the brilliant
plumage of the tropics, comes to seek his daily
fare. But, as far as I could perceive, after two
seasons of observation, he does not make his
nest in the trees. Holes in lofty walls, and in
stately ruins, are the favourite places for his
nidification. The cradle plumage of his young
displays the metallic colours of after-life ; hence,
there is no perceptible difference in the appear-
ance of the adult male and female. After
passing the summer months in Europe, he
returns to Africa at the autumnal equinox.

The aerial movements of this bird put one
in mind of our own rook, when in the act of
shooting downwards from on high. He rises
perpendicularly, and then descends in rapid zig-
zag evolutions, during which process, if you
get betwixt the sun and him, you have a mag-
nificent view of his lovely plumage. His voice
has something in it of the united notes of the
jay and magpie.

Innovations in modern ornithology, so prolific

THE ROLLER. 31

of scientific confusion and unimportant dis-
tinctions, have removed this bird from the
family of Pie, where it had had a place from
time immemorial; thus rendering useless its
most ancient name of Pica marina.

•It was knovm in the time of the Romans.
" Picus in auspiciis avis observata Latinis ; "
and it was also admitted into heathen mythology.
Virgil alludes to the beautiful colours in its
wing ; and above two thousand years ago, when
the gods used to change men into other animals,
just as easily as we nowadays change our acts
of parliament, the Pica marina was both king
and horsebreaker, " equum domitor." He was
married to the celebrated Circe, an enchantress
of the first order ; she who changed the sailors
of Ulysses into swine. The royal horsebreaker
had unfortunately shown a partiality for a young
woman in his own neighbourhood, a thing not
altogether unknown in our days. This so en-
raged his wife, that with her magic rod, far
more potent than finger nails, she transformed
him into a bird ; and, at the same time, bespan-
gled his wings with beautiful colours.

" Fecit avem Circe, sparsitque coloribus alas,"

THE HOLLY.

THE HOLLY.

" See, Winter comes to rule the varied year,
I Sullen and sad, with all his rising train,
Vapours, and clouds, and storms." Thomson.

I AM very partial to the holly, the yew, and the
ivy. They give both food and shelter to the
birds ; whilst their charming green foKage
makes us almost forget that winter has set in.
The holly claims my preference ; for, in ad-
dition to food and shelter, it aifords an im-
penetrable retreat to those birds which take up
their quarters on its branches for the night.

Our ancestors knew and felt the value of the
holly hedge, when the wintry blast whistled
through the naked hawthorn. Hence they
raised it as a barrier against the north ; and, on
the breaking of the clouds at noon, they would
resort to the protection which it offered, and
there enjoy the sun's delightful presence. But
modern innovation, which, in nine times out of
ten, does more harm than good, seems to have
condemned the holly hedge as a thing of stiff
unsightly form, and in its vacant place has in-

THE HOLLY. 33

troduced a scanty sprinkling of isolated plants.
I own that I am for the warm arboreous plan
of ancient days ; and thus I never pass a garden
where yew and holly hedges grow, without
stopping to admire them, and then I proceed
onwards with favourable notions of the owner's
taste.

But, to the holly in particular. I am so
convinced of its utility both to men and birds,
that I have spared no pains in rearing it as a
shelter from the cold, when Boreas, sure har-
binger of storms, sweeps over the dreary waste.

The deeper and richer the soil, so much the
better for the holly. Still, this favourite plant of
mine will thrive almost in any soil, and even
amongst the clefts of rocks, where there is scarcely
any soil at all. Neither can any of the four rude
winds of heaven affect the perpendicular growth
of the holly tree, although they make an im-
pression upon the sturdy oak itself. Thus, in
this neighbourhood, whilst we see the elm and
the beech leaning towards the east by the over-
bearing pressure of the western blast, we find
that the holly has not given way to its impe-
tuosity. Indeed, keep the roots of the holly
clear of stagnant water, and you have little
»

34) THE HOLLY.

more to do, for it forms its own defence ; and,
moreover, it has one advantage over most othei
plants, namely, it can push its way successfully
up amid surrounding shade and pressure. Its
lateral branches, too, will take root, so soon as
they come in contact with the soft soil beneath
them.

If you place a young holly plant in a full-
grown hawthorn hedge, it Mall vegetate in that
incommodious site ; and will manage, at last,
to raise its head aloft, and flourish clear of all
opposition. Thus, driven from his native home,
perhaps through scarcity of wheat and whiskey,
I have known a hardy son of Caledonia, al-
though put in a situation apparently hostile to
advancement either in fame or in fortune, main-
tain himself under fearful trials of adversity.
In process of time, his perseverance and honesty
were crowned by complete success. He took
kindly to it, where you thought there would be
no chance of ever getting on ; but, by carefully
watching his hour of advance, in the death of
this competitor or in the negligence of that,
this frugal, careful, steady emigrator from the
North, moved slowly onwards, till, in due good
time, he passed through all surrounding diiR-

THE HOLLY. 35

culties : and, having got at last into the full
sunshine of good fortune, he there took the
lead on the high road to long expected wealth
and honours.

He whose nerves would be affected at the
sight of a straight holly hedge, might prevent
their irritation by forming a crescent ; say a
segment of a circle to a radius of sixty yards.
This would present a fine appearance to the
eye, whilst it shut out both the north-west and
the north-east winds of winter. Hollies, too,
may be planted in a clump, with very pleasing
effect to the beholder. I consider a regularly
formed clump of hollies to be the perfection of
beauty, in grouped arboreal design. One single
tree of mountain ash in the centre of this would
add another charm to it, and would be of use
to the ornithologist at the close of summer.
When the holly trees are in full bearing, and
the berries ripe, we may roam a long while
through the whole extent of British botany,
before we find a sight more charming to the
eye than the intermixture of bright red and
green which this lovely plant produces.

I have a fine circular clump of hollies here,
under which the pheasants are fed ; and to

36 THE PIOLLY.

which, throughout the whole of the winter, a
vast number of sparrows, green linnets, bun-
tings, blackbirds, and some starlings resort, to
take their nocturnal repose in peace and quiet.
The holly sheds a large proportion of its leaves
after the summer has set in. These remain on
the ground in thick profusion. So formidable
are their hard and pointed spikes to the feet of
prowling quadrupeds, that neither the cat, nor
the weasel, nor the foumart, nor the fox, nor
even the ever-hungry Hanoverian rat, dare in-
vade the well-defended territory. Hence the
birds, which in yew trees and in ivy would be
exposed to inevitable destruction from the at-
tacks of these merciless foes, are safe from dan-
gler in the holly bush.

People generally imagine that the holly is of
tardy growth. It may be so in ordinary cases ;
but means may be adopted to make this pLmt
increase with such effect as to repay us amply
for all our extra labour and expense. Thus,
let us dig the ground to a full yard in depth,
and plant the hollies during the last week of
May, taking care to puddle their roots well into
the pulverised soil. We shall find, by the end
of September, that many of the plants will have

THE HOLLY. 6i

shot nearly a foot in length, and that not one
of them has failed, let the summer have been
ever so dry. Small plants, bought in a nursery,
and placed in your ov^^n garden for a couple of
years, will be admirably adapted for the process
of transplanting. Had 1 been aware in early
life of this encouraging growth of the holly, it
should have formed all my fences in lieu of
hawthorn, which, after arriving at full ma-
turity, suddenly turns brown in summer, and
dies in a few weeks, without having given any
other previous notice of near approaching decay.

Birds in general are not fond of holly berries;
but many sorts will feed upon them when
driven by " necessity's supreme command."
Thus, during the time that the fields are clad
in snow, and the heps and the haws have al-
ready been consumed, then it is that the red-
wing, the blackbird, the fieldfare, and the
stormcock, numbed by the cold, and bold
through want of food, come to the berry-bearing
holly close to your house, and there too often
fall a prey to the gun of the designing fowler.

In these days of phantom schemes and
national extravagance, when work is scarce and
penury fast increasing, the holly tree is doomed

V 3

S8 THE HOLLY.

to suffer from the lawless pilferer's hand.
When least expected, you find it arrested in its
growth. Its smaller branches by degrees lose
their vitality, and, by the end of the following
year, one half of the tree appears as though it
had received a blast from the passing thunder-
storm. This declining aspect of the holly has
been occasioned by the hand of sordid mischief.
It is well known that birdlime is produced from
its bark. In the spring of the year, at earliest
dawn of day, our finest holly trees in this
neighbourhood are stripped of large pieces of
their bark by strolling vagabonds, who sell it to
the nearest druggist. So common has this act
of depredation been in this vicinity, that I
should be at a loss to find a single holly tree,
in any hedge outside of the park wall, that has
escaped the knife of these unthinking spoilers.
Some six or seven years ago, there stood in
the ornamented grounds of my baronet neigh-
bour a variegated holly of magnificent growth,
and it bore abundant crops of berries ; a cir-
cumstance not very frequent in hollies of this
kind. Many a half hour have I stood to admire
this fine production of nature ; for it was un-
paralleled, in this part of Yorkshire, in beauty.

THE HOLLY. o\)

size, and vigour. But, at last, it was doomed
to perish by a plundering and an unknown
hand ; one morning in spring I found the whole
of its bark stripped oflf the bole, for full two
feet in length. Notwithstanding this disaster,
the berries became ripe in due time ; whilst its
leaves apparently retained their wonted verdure
upon the greater branches. Even the year fol-
lowing it was alive, and put forth new leaves
and blossoms : but the leaves were of a stinted
growth, and the berries did not attain their
usual size. During the course of the third
year from the day of its misfortune, the whole
of the foliage fell to the ground ; and then the
tree itself became, like our giant debt, a dead
unsightly weight upon the land.

D 4

40 THE SQUIRREL.

THE SQUIRREL.

[This paper was written in answer to one by Mr. Wighton
in the Gardener's Magazine for March, 1843, in which it was
asserted that squirrels sometimes feed on birds. ]

Horticulture and zoology are contiguous
provinces. Surely, then, no one in these
days of liberality can find fault with Mr.
Wighton for straying a little out of bounds.
Let him not fear the apparition of a birch rod.

If squirrels injure the shoots of my spruce
firs, which they are known to frequent, trivial
indeed must be the damage, and quick the re-
paration by old Dame Nature, for the trees
bear no marks of aggression.

Had the squirrel been wild, in the wild woods,
at the time that Mr. Wighton saw it eat the birds,
I should not hesitate to pronounce that indi-
vidual squirrel to be carnivorous, because I
believe that Mr. Wighton would only state
what he conceived to be " correct." Still, we
must allow that there are exceptions to all rules.
Don Quixote put Sancho Panza in mind that
summer did not always set in vvdth the appear-
ance of the first swallow. Sir William Jardine

THE SQUIRREL. 41

shot a barn owl in the very act of hooting.
Probably, neither the baronet, nor any body
else, will ever perform a similar feat, for barn
owls do not hoot.

I gather from Mr. Wighton's communication
that his squirrel was in captivity when it par-
took of a carnal repast. This single fact at
once precludes the possibility of the squirrel
family being raised to the rank of carnivo-
rous animals. The incarceration only of " a
few days " might have injured the prisoner
seriously, either in his nervous system, or in
his gastric powers, or in his olfactory sen-
sibilities. Now, a sudden derangement in all,
or even in any one, of these component parts
of a squirrel's frame, might have affected his
health sufficiently to have induced him to try a
change of larder ; and, should this have been
the case, I don't know a nicer morsel for the
alterative system than a tender and a well-fed
swallow. Under existing circumstances (loss of
liberty, to wit), I am not at all astonished that
Mr. Wighton's squirrel should dine on bird, raw
or roasted we are not informed ; even though
the said squirrel were well supplied, on the
same table, " with his favourite kind of food."

42 THE SQUIRREL.

I wish we knew more than we do of the car-
nivorous propensities, or the want of them, in
certain animals. We might then be able to
account tolerably well for many strange occur-
rences, which every now and then puzzle us so
much, in the workings of zoological gastronomy.
So unaccountable, indeed, are sometimes the
actions both of man and beast, not only in the
eating department, but also in domestic arrange-
ments, that we might really fancy the performers
not to be quite right in their heads.

Whilst I am actually writing this, there are
two geese on the lawn before me. One of
them is a Canada goose, the other a barnacle
gander. The latter is about half the size of
the former. Notwithstanding this disparity,
the old fool of a goose has taken the insignificant
little fellow into connubial favour, although
there are four and twenty others of the Canada
species here, from which she has it fully in her
power to make a more profitable choice. Sin-
gi^ar to tell, this is the third year that these
infatuated simpletons have paired, and the goose
laid eggs, without any chance of a progeny.
And, in high quarters, sortletimes unions take
place, where the husband is ignorant of the

THE SQUIRREL. 43

language of his wife, and the wife of that of
her husband.

How capricious, then, is the taste, not only
of Mr. Wighton's captive squirrels, but also of
geese, and eke of man himself! By only " a
few days'" loss of liberty, I have shown that
Mr. Wighton's pretty squirrel preferred the flesh
of birds to its own " favourite kind of food."

My tom-cat, apparently an excellent mouser,
will sometimes prefer dry biscuit to a mutton
chop. Sterne's ass seemed to relish macaroon.
Did all asses relish macaroon, we might doubt
the fitness of the Spanish proverb, " La miel no
es para la boca del asno : " Honey is not made
for the mouth of the ass. Parrots in cages will
pull off their own feathers, and eat them by
the dozen. Blackbirds, although on very short
allowance, caused by the frosty weather, would
not touch their favourite ivy berries, which were
thrown down in abundance for them in the
garden of my friend, Mr. Loudon of Bayswater.
I knew a healthy old owl who took her con-
finement so much to heart that she refused all
kind of food, and died at last for want of it.
And, when I was in the Mediterranean Sea, I
saw a brute in the shape of man, swallow pieces

44 GIGANTIC RASPBERRIES.

of raw fowl (which he had torn asunder,
feathers and all,) with as much avidity as Sir
Robert Peel devours our incomes.

Should Mr. Wighton read this paper, he
cannot fail to perceive that I have many serious
obstacles to overcome, before I can arrive at
the very important conclusion, that the family
of squirrel is carnivorous in its own native
haunts.

GIGANTIC RASPBERRIES

When I altered Walton Hall, I destroyed the
finest garden, for its size, in Yorkshire. But
there was no help for it. I was absolutely
forced to turn Vandal, and blot it out from the
face of the earth. The raspberries in it always
grew to the height of fourteen feet. Situation
caused this growth. I once, in my rambles in
Lancashire, fell in with a like situation, and
there I found wild raspberries growing fully as
high. To obtain this luxuriant growth, the
situation must be low and rich ; and the rasp-

GIGANTIC RASPBERRIES. 45

berry plants must be shielded from the noonday
sun by trees, or a high wall. Trees, I should
say, would be better. We had always wooden
steps on purpose to reach the fruit. My father
sent plants of these raspberries to his friends in
Yorkshire, and in the county of Nottingham,
but they answered not the expectations which
had been formed of them. When I destroyed
the garden, I saved a sufficient quantity of
plants to be cultivated elsewhere. They are
still in existence, and their puny growth in-
forms me that I must never more expect to see
them in their former luxuriance. When I re-
moved the soil on which they had flourished so
suprisingly, I found stony fragments at the
bottom, through which there ran a stream of
water v/hich got vent from the mouth of a drain
at the opposite side of the garden.

46 THE CAYMAN.

THE CAYMAN.

"The crocodile, in fact, is only dangerous when in the
water. Upon land it is a slow-paced and even timid animal ;
so that an active boy armed with a small hatchet might
easily dispatch one. There is no great prowess therefore
required to ride on the back of a poor cayman after it has been
secured or perhaps wounded ; and a modern writer might
well have spared the recital of his feats in this way upon the
cayman of Guiana, had he not" been influenced in this and
numberless other instances, by the greatest possible love of
the marvellous, and a constant propensity to dress truth in the
garb of fiction. " — Extract from Lardner's Cabinet Cyclopedia ;
Fishes, vol. ii. p. 111.

SwAiNSON, wholesale dealer in closet-zoology,
was never in the wilds of Guiana, where the
book of Wanderings was written. Hence any
comment on the above extract were loss of
labour and of time.

His erroneous account of the cayman at once
shows me that he never saw tliis animal in its
native haunts.

I stop not here to tell the world how I came
to incur the hostility of this morbid and pre-
sumptuous man. Suffice it to say, that for-
merly, in friendship (for I personally knew his
worthy father), I used to give him ornitholo-

THE CAYMAN. 47

gical information. But his behaviour was such
that I found myself under the absolute ne-
cessity of discontinuing my correspondence
with him : and this laid the foundation of that
animosity which at last has induced him
publicly to call in question my veracity, vsdth-
out fortifying his rash act vnth any proof what-
ever. Let me here inform this dealer in
unsound Zoology, that my veracity is the only
article upon which I feel that I have a positive
right to plume myself, in the two small volumes
which I have presented to the world. And
now for the cayman ; first apologising to the
reader for this disagreeable though necessary
prologue.

Those who have had no opportunity of ex-
amining the crocodile and cayman in the
regions where they are found, may form a
tolerably correct notion of them (making a due
allowance for size) by an inspection of the
little lizard which inhabits the warmer parts of
Europe. And should they not have it in their
power to travel out of England, they may
still acquire a competent idea of these animals
by looking at the newt, which is common in
most of our gardens : for, notwithstanding the

43 THE CAYMAN.

frivolous objections which Swainson has offered
to the contrary, I consider these monsters of
tropical climates neither more nor less than
lizards of an extraordinary size, and in this the
Spaniards agree with me; — for on their first
arrival in the New World, seeing that the
cayman was an overgrown Kzard, both in form
and habits, they called it " una lagarta," which
is the Spanish name for a lizard.

The British, in course of time, having seized
on the settlements formed by the Spaniards,
soon became acquainted with the cayman, and
on hearing the Spaniards exclaim "una lagarta"
when this animal made its appearance, they, in
their turn, called it an alligator ; for so the
two Spanish words, " una lagarta," sounded in
the English ear. I got this information many
years ago from a periodical of wliich I remember
not the name.

The little lizard which darts at a fly on the
sunny banks along the roads of Southern
Europe, gives the spectator an excellent idea
of the cayman in the act of taking its prey in
the tropics ; and whilst he views the pretty
green creature turning sharply and quickly on
the ground before him, he may see in ima-

THE CAYMAN. 49

gination, the movements of the cayman on
the banks of the Essequibo, after the dry season
has set in.

I once fell in with a fry of young caymans
on dry land near the river Essequibo. They
were about a foot in length, and they twisted
and turned in all directions with the agility of
rabbits. One of them got entangled in the
weeds. It fought fiercely before we succeeded
in capturing it, and Daddy Quashi had it for
his supper.

Crocodile is the eastern name, and cayman
or alligator the western name for this huge
lizard.

It is now high time to reject the many
fabulous accounts of the crocodile. Their
shedding tears, and their devouring the young-
ones as soon as hatched, are inventions only for
the nursery fire-side.

Master Swainson's assertion that the crocodile
" conveys its food to some hole at the edge of
the water, where it is sufiered to putrefy before
it is devoured," may suit an infant school, but
it will be rejected with a smile of contempt by
any one who has paid the least attention to
the anatomy of the crocodile's head. The

50 THE CAYMAN.

dissector would see that the mouth of this
reptile is completely formed for snatch and
swallow. Now any common observer of the
habits of animals with a mouth so formed must
know, at first sight, that these animals never
eject food which has once entered the mouth.
Down the throat it goes immediately, unless
there be some impediment, as in the case of
a stag's horns. Supposing for an instant (but
no one except a second Master Swainson
could suppose such a manifest absurdity) that
the crocodile does really place his food in a
hole until putridity commences ; pray how is
the animal to secure it from his ravenous
fellow crocodiles ? — or by what process is he to
curb his own hmiger until the lardered morsel
be ready for deglutition ?

The old hackneyed account of crocodiles
devouring their own young when newly hatched
is really unworthy of refutation. Depend upon
it, no such unnatural banquet takes place ; for
the crocodiles are never reduced to so abhorrent
a necessity. The rivers which they inhabit
abound with fish, both large and small : and on
these the crocodiles feed, as well as on fresh-
water turtle. And as to the vultures watching

THE CAYMAN. 51

individuals of the family of crocodile until they
have laid their eggs, and then devouring them,
it is an ancient fable, which, like Don Quixote's
library of romances, ought to be throvm to the
fire in the court-yard, and there burnt with
the rest of the trash. I can positively affirm
that neither in the Essequibo nor in the Oro-
noque did I see one single solitary attempt of
a vulture to invade the spot where a cayman
had deposited her eggs. The cayman, in fact,
may perform her task with impunity, whilst
hundreds of vultures are standing motionless
on the branches of a tree hard by, where they
remain till hunger bids them be stirring, and
then they all take wing and fly away in quest
of carrion. Had they been watching the
cayman's treasures, they would have descended
from the tree, and not have ascended in aerial
flight.

The cayman not unfrequently lays its eggs
in a heap of dry leaves. The eggs afford good
nourishment to man. They are about the size
of those of a turkey, perhaps somewhat larger.
The outside of the shell is rough, and of a dirty
white colour. Probably it is quite white when
first deposited.

52 THE CAYMAN.

This formidable animal, being able to exist
either in water or on the land, may be styled
amphibious to the fullest extent of the word.
Master Swainson, notwithstanding his "com-
passion for the poor animals," and his interested
wish to make his readers believe that they are
of a timid nature, would have found himself
awkwardly situated had he been in my position
when I attacked the cayman mentioned in the
Wanderings ; — the Indians positively refusing
to drag it out of the water, until I had placed
myself betwixt them and danger.

I once saw a cayman in the Oronoque thirty
feet in length, and another of the same size in
the Essequibo. This animal is an inhabitant
of the fresh waters, although occasionally he
may be found in the mouths of rivers where the
water is salt ; but when this occurs we may
conclude to a certainty, that he has been carried
down the descending flood against his will.

Whilst I was in Guiana a cayman was killed
in the salt water of the Essequibo, just opposite
to the island of Waakenham.

We formerly learned from our nursery books
that animals of the crocodile family have skins
hard enough to turn a musket-ball. This

THE CAYMAN. 53

requires explanation. No part of the ca3Tnan's
body is absolutely proof against a musket-balh
Let it be recollected, that in shooting at one
of these reptiles, we stand invariably above it^
so that the ball from our gun, after striking the
animal obliquely, flies off, and merely leaves a
contusion. Although the back is very hard,
the sides are comparatively tender, and can be
easily pierced through with an ordinary pen-
knife. The tail is not near so hard as the back,
and, singular to tell, the tail of the smaller kind,
about five feet in length, is much stronger than
that of the larger species.

In a creek up the river Demerara, I could
any day see an adult cayman of this smaller
species. It had chosen for its place of abode
a kind of recess amongst the flooded trees
bordering on the creek ; and it was so awake
to danger, that I could not get a shot at it.
After trying various and unsuccessful schemes
to capture it, I took a curial at last just large
enough to hold two people. I squatted in the
prow, and Daddy Quashi steered it without
making any stir in the water. Having cocked
my gun, and placed it against my slioulder in
a position ready to fire, the curial was allowed

54 THE CAYMAN.

to drift silently down the stream, when, just as
we got opposite the place where the cayman
was lurking, I pulled the trigger and shot it.
The whole of the afternoon was spent in
dissecting it, and I found it fully as tenacious
of life as the land tortoise itself.

The mouth of the cayman is furnished with
a most formidable row of teeth in each jaw,
but they are peculiarly shaped for snatch and
swallow. He has no grinders ; hence no
laceration of the food can take place in the
mouth. But a contest will often ensue
amongst the congregated reptiles, when the
morsel is too large for deglutition ; and then
each individual snatches at what it can get,
and pulls away the piece. The nose of the
cayman forms a pretty rotund figure. This,
together with the rough protuberance which
guards the eye from above, may be modelled
by my new process, and rendered as elevated
as it appeared during the life of the animal.
When Swainson tells us that the snout of
crocodiles and caymans is unusually depressed,
I know immediately that he has been at his
wonted employment of examining a dried skin.

In dissecting a cayman for preservation, you

THE CAYMAN. 55

may separate the tail at every other joint.
This division renders the process extremely
easy. The head also may be divided from the
body, and replaced afterwards vrith great
success. After the whole of the dissection is
finished, you steep the skin for about a quarter
of an hour in the solution of corrosive sublimate,
and then, by means of sand, you proceed to
restore the form and feature which the animal
possessed in life.

An adept in this new mode of preparing
zoological specimens for Museums ( see the
Essays) would be enabled to bring home an
alligator very superior indeed to those hung
up in apothecaries' shops during the life of
Shakspeare — " An alligator stuffed." My
cayman is now in as good condition as it was
on the day in which I dissected it ; and it will
set decay at defiance for centuries to come,
provided no accident befal it.

I have mentioned briefly in the Wanderings,
an account which the governor of Angustura
gave me of the boldness and ferocity of the
cayman. I may here repeat the story some-
what more at length.

In the year 1808, I carried Lord Colling-

56 THE CAYMAN.

wood's despatches up the Oronoque to the city
of Angustura, where the Spanish governor,
Don Felipe de Ynciarte, resided. I corre-
sponded with him for some time afterwards.
He was a soldier, of vast information in the
Natural History of the country ; and had been
a great explorer in his time. He showed me a
large map of Spanish Guiana, having made it
from his own personal survey of those regions
in early life. On the breaking out of the
revolutionary war, which, according to Canning's
rambKng speculation, was to give rise to a
thousand republics, this true Spaniard fought
for King Ferdinand VII. But fortune having
declared against him he left the Oronoque, and
retired to the island of Santa Cruz, where
death closed his mortal career.

The Spaniards, who have more of pleasure
than of puritanism in their composition, think
it no harm, after they have performed the
sacred duties of the day, to enjoy a fine Sunday
evening, in gay attire, on the Alameda or
public walk, where there is generally a band of
music. I had resorted to the walk attached to
Angustura, and was in company vdth Governor
Ynciarte, when he stopped on reaching a certain

THE CAYMAN.

57

place, and begged my attention to what he was
going to relate. " Don Carlos," said he to me,
" mark the opening which leads to the Oro-
noque. I was on this very spot, a great
number of the inhabitants being present, when
there suddenly came out of the river an enor-
mous cayman. It seized a man close by me,
and carried him off to the water, where it sank
with him to appear no more. The attack was
so sudden, and the animal so tremendous, that
none of us had either time or courage to go to
the unfortunate man's rescue."

This certainly could not have been one of
Master Swainson's " slow-paced and even timid
animals," which " an active boy armed with a
small hatchet " might easily have despatched.

In 1 824, I read in one of the newspapers at
New York, a detailed account of the death of
one of our consul's sons. The youth would
bathe in the river Madalena, in opposition to
all that the Spaniards could say against so rash
an act, on account of the numbers and ferocity
of the caymans there. He had not fairly
entered the water, when he was seized by a
ca}Tnan and disappeared for ever.

How these dismal exhibitions of cayman

58 THE CAYMAN.

ferocity throw utter discredit upon what has
been supplied to Lardner's Cabinet Cyclopcedia,
on Fishes, vol. ii. p. 111., by Swainson! Had
he ever seen anything of the habits of the
cayman, surely he would have paused before
he informed his readers in Lardner, " We often
jnet with them [caymans] in the same country
as Mr. Waterton, [How comes this ? Swainson
was never either in Spanish or in Dutch
Guiana, in which territories only I fell in with
the cayman.] but they were so timid that had
we been disposed to perform such ridiculous
feats as that traveller narrates, our compassion
for the poor animals would have prevented us."

I have now given, as far as I am able, a true
history of the cayman, without any exaggera-
tion, quite free from Swainson's base accusation
of my " constant propensity to dress truth in
the garb of fiction ; " and I stake what little
honour and credit I have hitherto gained with
the public on the correctness of it

Should the reader believe me on my word,
and then compare my account of the cayman
with that which Swainson wrote for Lardner,
he must evidently come to the following con-
clusion, viz.- — that Swainson, when he wrote

THE CAYMAN. 59

his account of this reptile, was either totally
unacquainted with its habits and economy, or
that he wilfully perverted them, and made out
the cayman to be a " slow-paced and even timid
animal," in order to be revenged on me, who
had described it as swift, and one of extra-
ordinary ferocity : for, be it known, that in
1837, I found myself under the necessity of
writing to Swainson a very pungent ornitho-
logical letter, which was printed. He never
answered this letter, and I thought that I had
done with him altogether, till in 1839, whilst I
was in Italy, out came Lardner's volume on
Fishes, containing the sweeping extract which
I have transcribed at the head of this paper.
Swainson was then about to take his final de-
parture to New Zealand. Steam will soon
convey to him a copy of this. I call upon him
to contradict the statements which it contains,
— or to acknowledge the truth and the pro-
priety of them.

60 THE YEW TREE.

THE YEW TREE.

I NEVER cast my eyes on the mouldering fabrics
which once adorned this land, without renew-
ing my veneration for the memory of the holy
and useful monks who have gone before us.
There is still enough left of the falHng walls
to show how much these faithful friends of
the poor and needy must have been esteemed
through the whole extent of the nation: and
when I sit me down under the dark foliage of
some ancient yew tree, which has escaped the
fury of the destroying Vandals, and think of the
miserable state to which the sons of poverty are
now reduced, I cannot help heaving a sigh, whilst
my very heart itself seems to sink within me.

I am extremely partial to the yew tree. It
has already repaid me for the pains which I
have taken in its cultivation ; and when I resort
to my usual evening stand, in order to watch
the flocks of sparrows, finches, and starlings,
whilst they are dropping in upon the neigh-
bouring hollies, I feel not the wintry blast ; as

THE YEW TREE. 61

the yew trees, which are close at hand, are to
me a shield against its fury ; and, in fact, they
oiFer me a protection little inferior to that of
the house itself.

I have not been sparing in the arrangement
of ornamental yew trees. Just sixty yards from
the bridge which joins the island to the main,
there is a yew tree crescent, three hundred feet
in extent; and not far from this, there are
some fine clumps of the same plant, producing
a very pleasing effect. Should he, who will
succeed to them when I am low in dust, have
the philosophy to set at naught the modern
disapprobation of ornamental planting in lines
and circles, he will always command the sweet
warbling of unnumbered songsters, from earliest
spring to latest simimer : for the yew tree is a
kind friend to the feathered race ; and the wren
and the hedge-sparrow will sing sweetly amidst
its foliage throughout the autumn, and even
after the winter season has set in.

The cultivation of the yew tree is sure and
simple. It will thrive in any soil that is clear
of swamp : but, the richer the soil, the
richer is the appearance of its foliage ; and if
the planter will trench his ground from two to

62 THE YEW TREE.

tnree feet deep, throvnng back into the bottom
the worst of what has been removed, and re-
serving the best for the upper stratum, he is
sure to be handsomely requited by a rapid
growth of the trees.

Although the yew tree is a hardy plant, and
fond of cold regions (" amantes frigora taxi "),
still it will be much more vigorous in the shel-
tered valley, than on the bleak hill exposed to
the vdntry blast. Our western gales here in
Yorkshire press far too keenly on its foliage,
and render the side which is exposed to their
fury as thin and wretched in appearance, as
the face of a metropolitan alderman would be
on Easter Sunday morning, after having strug-
gled through forty long days of uiunitigated
fasting. Provided you do not care about
having your yew tree in all the exuberance of
uncurbed vegetation, you may apply the pru-
ning-knife and shears with a safe and an un-
sparing hand ; for the yew tree will submit to
curtailment with good eifect, and without any
apparent diminution of vitality. If we chp its
southern side in imitation of a wall, and allow
that which faces the north to flourish in its
natural state, we shall have from the same line

THE YEW TREE. 63

of trees a walk impervious to the blast of
Boreas for ourselves, and a provision of berries
for the birds, at a time when their more or-
dinary supply of food is considerably on the
decrease.

Charming is the appearance of the yew tree
after the sun has passed the autumnal equinox.
The delicate crimson of its fruit, with the dark
green leaves behind it, produces an effect so
pleasing to the view, that it can scarcely be
surpassed by any thing which the southern
forests present to the lover of botany, as he
wanders through their mazes.

The bole of this tree possesses the power
of effectually reproducing a supply of main
branches, after the original ones have been
severed from it by the axe of the woodman. At
Lupset Hall, the residence of our former ho-
nest member for Wakefield, Daniel Gaskell,
Esq., there stands a lordly yew, by far the most
gigantic of any in this neighbourhood. At some
period of time, now long gone by, all its larger
branches have been cut away from the stem.
Others now supply their place ; and by the pre-
sent healthy aspect of the tree, we may conclude
that, at some future day, this second series of

64 THE YEW TREE.

main branches will have attained a growth
and vigour equal to what the original ones
would have presented to us, had they been al-
lowed to remain on the tree.

Ere the combined force of charcoal and salt-
petre had enabled us to blow ourselves up in-
stantaneously, we followed the slower process
of destroying life by means of the bow made
from the yew tree : and this, to men of mo-
derately sanguinary habits, must, I think, have
been sufficiently expeditious : for we learn,
at the hunting-fray of Chevy Chase, that,

" The English archers bent their bows.
Their hearts -were good and true ;
At the first flight of arrows sent,
Full threescore Scots they slew."

The bow from the yew. tree was in use by
private sportsmen as well as by warriors. In
the very old song of the Sow and the Tailor,
the latter cries out,

" Wyfe, wyfe, bring me my yewen bow,
That I maye shoot the carrion crow."

Some people are of opinion, that the yew
tree was planted close to the churches by way

THE YEW TREE. 65

of protection, in order that there might always
be a good supply of bows in case of war. The
Catholic church, which was founded to preach
peace on earth to men of good will, never could
have patronised botany for sanguinary purposes.
No doubt whatever, the yew tree was planted
near the church for the facility of obtaining
sprigs and branches to be used during the pro-
cessions. Religious processions were in high
request amongst our pious ancestors. They
were an admirable mode of imparting a know-
ledge of the sacred mysteries of religion to all
ranks of people. Terrible indeed has been the
loss to our nation by their suppression.

Selborne's immortal naturalist cautions us
not to let our cattle feed upon the foliage of
the yew; and he gives us an instance of its
deadly effects. Hence, I have taken the pre-
caution to fence my clumps of yew trees round
with an impenetrable hedge of hollies. Sprigs
newly taken from the growing yew tree are
said not to be poisonous ; but in the course of
three or four days, a change takes place in them,
and then their noxious quality prevails. But the
ripe berries of the yew tree are certainly not
deleterious, as I myself can prove by frequent

F

66 THE YEW TREE.

personal trial. Indeed, nothing is more com-
mon in this neighbourhood, when autumn has
set in, than to see the village lads idling under
yew trees, and partaking plentifully of the
fruit, which they appositely call snottle-berries.

Ovid considered the appearance of the yew
tree sufficiently lugubrious to give it a place on
the liill-side which led down to the infernal re-
gions, — " funesta nubila taxo." And we learn
from Julius Caesar, that it proved fatal to the
human species ; for King Cativolcus, after
heartily cursing his ally Ambiorix, for having
brought him into an irretrievable scrape, had
recourse to the yew tree, in order to bid this
wicked world adieu for ever: — ^"Taxo, cujus
magna in Gallia, Germaniaque copia est, se
exanimavit."

The Spaniards, in the days of Cervantes, ap-
plied sprigs of yew to mournful purposes, as
we gather from the story of Chrysostomo. This
unhappy swain fell into languor, and died for
the love of the shepherdess Marcela; and his
friend performed his obsequies with wreaths of
yew and cypress ; " Eran, qual de texo, y qual
de Cypres." But, here in England, the yew
sprig, far from being thought an emblem of

THE YEW TREE. 67

grief, is chosen to be the harbinger of mer-
riment and joy. Scarcely has the sun's full
stop at the Tropic of Capricorn announced to
us the dawn of the shortest day, ere the house-
maid begins to set her rooms in order ; and the
gardener is desired to prepare his sprigs of
holly, box, and yew, as ornaments for every
window, on the eve of the annual comme-
moration of that long promised day, when the
eternal Son of God was born of the Blessed
Virgin in a stable at Bethlehem for sinful
man's redemption.

If the leaves of the yew tree were armed
with sharp spikes like those of the holly, we
should have a treasure of a tree for the pro-
tection of the feathered tribe during the stormy
nights of winter. But the want of these re-
pellent appendages renders the yew tree highly
perilous to the birds which resort to its inviting
foliage for sleep or shelter, as the cat, the
stoat, the weasel, and the foumart can pervade
its branches with the utmost impunity : whilst
the Hanoverian rat, so notorious for self and
peK, is ever prying amongst them, and fleecing
their inmates wdth a perseverance scarcely to be
imagined.

68

THE IVY.

We live to learn. I was not sufficiently aware
of the value of ivy for the protection of the
feathered race, until I had seen the pheasant-
preserve of the Grand Duke of Tuscany, in
the year 1817. It is called the Cascini, and it
is a kind of Hyde Park for the inhabitants of
Florence in their evening recreations.

At the grove of the Cascini, you see the ivy
growing in all its lofty pride and beauty. As
I gazed on its astonishing luxuriance, I could
not help entertaining a high opinion of the per-
son, be he alive or dead, through whose care
and foresight such an effectual protection had
been afforded to the wild birds of heaven, in
the very midst of the " busy haunts of men."
Tlie trees in this ornamented grove are loaded
with a profusion of ivy, from their lowest to
their topmost branches ; and although crowds of
fashionable carriages were rolling along the
road which surrounds this preserve, I saw our
common pheasant roving through its walks,

THE IVY. 69

witli a confidence little inferior to that of our
own domestic poultry. As the evening closed
in upon us, I observed multitudes of the smaller
birds resorting to the " ivy-mantled " trees, in
order to enjoy the profiered convenience of
nocturnal rest and safety.

I have profited by what I saw in Tuscany, —
for, on my return to my native place, I began
the cultivation of ivy with an unsparing hand.

There are two sorts of this ever-verdant
plant. The one is denominated English, the
other Irish ivy. Both are exceedingly grace-
ful in their foliage ; but the first is by far the
better bearer of fruit. They will grow on any
soil, save that of swamp. Whilst the plant is
on the ground, you have only to cover its long
runners with a little earth at intervals of four
or five inches, and you will soon have an abun-
dant supply of ivy for ornament ; and for use, as
far as the birds are concerned. This is a surer
way of obtaining plants, than by cutting them
at once from the climbing ivy.

Ivy can only attain its greatest perfection
through the intervention of foreign bodies. It
travels onward in a lowly state upon the ground
until it reaches some inclined or perpendicular

F 3

70 THE IVY.

object, up which it ascends. In due time it
then puts out lateral branches, and obtains a
bole, as though it were a forest tree itself. Ivy
derives no nutriment from the timber tree to
which it adheres. It merely makes use of a
tree or wall, as we ourselves do of a walking-
stick, when old age or infirmities tell us that we
cannot do without it. Should an ancient wall
and iv}' come in contact, they are of great
assistance to each other. Dyer observed this
on Grongar hill : —

" Whose aged walls the ivy creeps,
And with her arms from falling keeps :
So, both a safety from the wind
In mutual dependence find."

There can be no doubt as to the real source
from whence ivy draws life and vigour : from
the ground alone its maintenance proceeds.
To be convinced of this, we have only to inspect
it narrowly on a living tree, and then pay the
same attention to it upon a dead one, or upon
any stump deprived of vitality. Be our eye as
keen as that of the lynx, we shall not be able
to perceive that the one plant is more healthy,
more vigorous, or more verdant than the other ;
and if we cut through the stock of the ivy in

THE IVY. 71

either situation, we shall see that its upper
parts will wither and die, down to the place
through which the knife has passed.

Some few years ago, a tall sycamore tree
stood on this island, in a row with four others.
A remnant of its once fine bole still occupies
the place which the tree adorned in the days of
its prosperity. An unexpected appearance of
fungus showed that all was not right within ;
and, ere long, a gale of wind cut the tree nearly
in two, sending its head and all its branches
(saving one), with a colony of yoimg jackdaws,
down into the lake below. The remaining
portion of the tree, spared by the gale, put out
new shoots from every part of its circumference.
But scarcely had these vegetated for four suc-
ceeding summers, when another immense fungus
made its appearance about two yards from the
truncated top, and all vegetation ceased that
year, down to the part where the fungus had
come out. Below this, the trunk was still
alive ; but another fungus, of equal dimensions
with the last, showed itself about five feet from
the ground, and deprived the bole of all vege-
tation upwards.

At length this sickly remnant of the syca-

/» THE IVY.

more tree received its final doom ; for, last
summer, a vast profusion of fungus pushed up
its circular cakes even from below the surface
of the ground ; and on their coming to maturity
all the living powers within this ill-treated tree
expired. The bole now stands a dead and un-
productive stump. Any day, a north-west wind,
sweeping across the water, may lay it low for
ever. Did the ivy, which I had planted at the
base many years ago, depend upon this bole for
succour, it would now be dead and withered ;
but, on the contrary, that remaining part of it,
free from mutilation when the different portions
of the tree fell down, is now in verdure, and
in primest vigour ; but as it has no longer an
opportunity of creeping upwards, on account of
the misfortunes which have befallen the tree,
it has assumed the form of a bush, with dense
and widely spreading foliage.

An opinion prevails, that ivy not only
deforms the branch to which it adheres, but
that it is injurious to the growth of the timber
itself. My wish for the preservation and
maintenance of birds urges me on to attempt
the defence of my favourite plant on these two
important points.

THE IVY. 73

The ivy which I planted many years ago
has now obtained a most luxuriant growth ; and,
if I may judge by what I see before my eyes, I
must conclude that ivy is noways detrimental
to the tree which has lent it a support. Having
given ivy to many trees and refused it to others
in the immediate vicinity, and on the same soil,
in order to have a good opportrmity of making
a fair examination, I find, upon minute in_
spection of these several trees, that they are all
of fine growth, and in a most healthy' state ;
those with ivy on them, and those without it,
not varying from each other in appearance
more than ordinary groups of forest trees are
wont to do. Neither is this to be wondered at
when we refiect that the ivy has its roots in the
ground itself, and that it does not ascend in
spiral progress round the bole and branches of
the tree ; its leading shoot is perpendicular.
Hence it is not in a position to compress inju-
riously the expansive powers of the tree, propor-
tionally stronger than its own. Thus we find
that the ivy gradually gives way before them ;
so that, on removing the network (if it may be
so called) which the ivy has formed on the bole
of the tree, we find no indentations there.

74 THE IVY.

But woodbine, acts the reverse of this. Its
process is spiral, and it becomes, as it were, an
immovable hoop on the plant which it has em-
braced. As the woodbine, by its circumambient
position cannot give way, the plant must conse-
quently protrude wherever it is not compressed,
till at last the woodbine becomes nearly buried
in it. Thus we account for the fantastic form
of walking-sticks, which are often to be seen at
the shop doors of curious venders. The spiral
hollows in these sticks are always formed by
the woodbine, never by the ivy.

Having the workings of the ivy, and those
of the woodbine, daily before my eyes, I venture,
without wisliing to impugn the opinion of others,
to assert, that the latter is injurious, and the
former not injurious to the plant which it has
embraced ; and this, by position alone ; for,
both having their own roots in the ground,
their nutriment is amply supplied from that
quarter.

Ivy, when planted on the eastern part of a
tree which grows in a high and very exposed
situation, can scarcely ever reach the opposite
portion of it, on account of the resistance which
it meets from the western blast. But it will

THE IVY. 75

grow well, when placed on the western side it-
self; for in this position the west wind presses
it to the bark of the tree, and thus becomes its
friend. I have a fair example of this in my
own park. On a bleak brow, there stands
the hollow remnant of an oak, which, in the
days of its prosperity, measured full twenty
feet in circumference. Fourteen years ago, I
planted ivy on its eastern side. But to this
day, that portion of the bole facing the west
remains uncovered by the ivy, which, in its
annual attempt to surmount the difficulty, is
arrested in its course, and ultimately driven
back by the fury of the western gales.

If we wish to see ivy growing in all the lux-
uriance of health and beauty, we must plant it
at the root of some tall Scotch fir, in a low and
sheltered situation. Nothing can be more
charming or lovely to the sight, than the widely-
extending mass of verdure with which it will
clothe the bole of the tree. I have a Scotch fir
here with ivy round it quite worthy the in-
spection of poor Charley Stuart himself, were
he still amongst us. The ivy sends its hori-
zontal branches out from the bole to a distance
of six or seven feet in vast profusion, and its

76 THE IVY.

verdure is so perfectly in unison with the foliage
of the fir, that, when you are standhig at a little
distance, you will be charmed with the addi-
tional beauty which it confers upon its stately
supporter.

He who may chance to read these essays
will see that I have cultivated with great suc-
cess my three favourite evergreens, the yew,
the holly, and the ivy. They give food and
shelter to many species of British birds, which
are so sadly persecuted by gardeners and
gamekeepers throughout the whole extent of
the land. I consider the ivy more serviceable
than the other two, as its berries ripen at a
season of the year when the ordinary food of
the fields is far from being plentiful. The
berries of the holly are abundant at the same
time, but the birds are not nearly so fond of
them.

"Without these ever-verdant auxiharies close
at hand, I should have but a poor chance of
observing the habits of our birds with satis-
faction to myself. Writers on ornithology may
consult volume after volume of other writers on
ornithology who have gone before them ; and
they may extract from the pages that which

THE IVY. 77

in their judgment may appear the best^ — but
unless they themselves have spent years in the
field, and those consulted have done the same, it
is to be feared, that their labours will fall short
of their wishes. Errors unintentional, and
false srurmises, and rash speculations will creep
into their works, in spite of every precaution
to avoid them. Their production, in truth,
will be, —

" similis volucri, — non vera volucris."

Probably, my statement that ivy is not in-
jurious to the tree which has lent it a support
may be at variance with the opinion of those
who are learned in botany. If so, 1 beg to say
that I have living forest trees, of all ages and
descriptions, to bear me out in what I have
advanced.

In conclusion, I wish to say a word or two
of mutual indentation produced by the union
of two forest trees. Near the walk which leads
to the flower-garden may be seen an English
elm and a Scotch fir growing in close embrace.
They are now fifteen feet in height, and one
foot ten inches in circumference at the base.
By twisting the leading shoot of one tree an-

78 THE IVY.

nually round that of the other, the trees have
become deeply embedded in each other's folds.
The ehn being of stronger vegetation than the
spruce, I have taken the precaution of curtail-
ing the lateral branches of the former, lest it
should prove too much for its weaker partner.

This firmly attached couple of vegetable
nature attracts considerable notice from pass-
ing visitors. When I chance to get hold of some
facetious Tory, whose mellowness of countenance
assures me that there is Kttle or no acidity
within, I tap him gently on the back and say,
whilst pointing to the trees : " See there, your
Church and State with a witness : a thrifty,
keen, and loving couple ! I have their ever-
lasting separation much at heart, and would be
happy to pronounce their immediate divorce,
without any fee or reward whatever."

NEW CHIMNEY-SWEEPING ACT. 79

THE NEW CHIMNEY-SWEEPING ACT.

« PeUitur, paternos in sinu ferens deos,
Et vir et uxor, sordidosque natos." Horace.

We shall be driven out of the house covered
with soot. Matthews, immortal mimic, in taking
off our vrestern brother Jonathan, used to make
him exclaim, " This is a free country, forsooth,
and they won't let a man flog his own nigger."
Were Matthews here now, he might remark,
with equal justness, " This is a land of liberty,
and a man can't go up his own chimney by law
till he be of age."

Our philanthropy of the present day too
often appears in a questionable shape ; whilst
those in power, who support its pretensions, do
as much mischief to the public weal, as a troop
of monkeys would do to a fruit garden in the
month of October. Witness the Act in ques-
tion, which our assembled Solons have passed
at the entreaty of certain incurable philanthro-
pists.

Whip me those members of both Houses of
Parliament, who have doomed us to the smoky

80 NEW CHIMNEY-SWEEPING ACT.

liorrors of a half-swept chimney. Had I old
Circe's power of witchcraft, when she changed
the sailors of Ulysses into swine, I would
transform every one of them into a goose ; and
they should be condemned to pass down our
chimneys once a month, in order to do the
needful with their wings and beaks.

England is a land of chimneys. She cannot
possibly do without them. There is scarcely
anything in the whole routine of our domestic
economy, that requires more consideration than
the state of our chimneys. A chimney that
answers well the end for which it was built
is a treasure of no small value ; whereas a
defective chimney is productive of so much
annoyance, that it has very aptly been placed
in the catalogue of miseries brought into a
house by the tongue of a scolding wife.

There are some placid people in England
who are for ever on the look out for objects
whereon to exercise their philanthropy. Did
the imprudent interference of these good people
bring expense and inconvenience on themselves
alone, nobody would care to complain ; but
when every householder in Great Britain
suffers both in purse and person, through their

NEW CHIMNEY-SWEEPING ACT. 81

unnecessary interference, then it is that one
feels authorised to take up the pen and show
how philanthropy may sometimes cause mis-
chief in its workings. "Witness the late unfor-
tunate expedition* up the river Niger. Witness
the subject of the present memoir.

It makes one sick at stomach oneself, to see
people straining dismally at a gnat in the shape
of a little chimney-sweep, and then to perceive
them swallowing, with great ease, a camel, under
the figure of a poor and unhealthy operative
employed in the factory.

Benevolence is certainly a heavenly feeling.
A generous heart will always rejoice to see it
operate in alleviation of real misery and op-
pression. Being doomed by Omnipotence,
through the original sin of Adam, to gain our
daily bread by the sweat of our brow, it requires
considerable reflection, ere we set about to alter
the long-established customs of our country;
lest, by an ill-judged interference, we do more

* I was consulted on the probable issue of that lamentable
undertaking. I used every argument in my power to prevent
its taking place. On seeing that my arguments were of no
avail, I said : " If you are determined that the experiment shall
be tried, go yourself, in person, and then you will have the
melancholy satisfaction of falling with the other victims."

ox NEW CHIMNEY-SWEEPING ACT.

harm than good. Tantum ne noceas, &c. Let
us remember that we are all creatures of habit ;
and that custom has been pronounced our second
nature. He who has been well trained to
labour, feels neither irksomeness nor pain in
the performance of his ordinary task ; although
the spectator who has been brought up in a
different manner, might fancy him to be both
weary and miserable.

We are too often misled by appearances, and
too apt to judge of another person's feelings by
our own. I know one, who, both in winter and
in summer, rises at half-past three o'clock in
the morning. He takes his nightly repose in a
room not over and above replete with dormitory
comforts ; and I have heard him say, that this
custom is neither hard nor unpleasant to him.
Still, another person, who studies personal
comfort, and who likes his feather-bed, would
consider it to be any thing but comfortable.
So it is with the little chimney-sweep. He has
been pitied for imaginary hardships ; and at last
driven, by Act of Parliament, out of employ-
ment, for supposed miseries to which he had
been a stranger.

To see, begrimed with soot, a pretty face, on

NEW CHIMNEY-SWEEPING ACT. 83

which there ought to be the rose and lily : — to
meet a tattered urchin riding on a donkey, with
his soot bag for a saddle ; or perhaps trudging
barefoot along the road ; all this impresses on a
philanthropist the idea, that the lot of this youth
is miserable, and that it must he amended. Let
us take a nearer view of this little son of soot.
See the beauty of the rogue's teeth ! — they are
as wliite as ivory, for the soot has polished and
preserved them, whilst our own are discoloured
and some of them gone to decay in spite of
old Rowland's Odonto. His back too is as
straight as a lance, and his limbs of the finest
proportions. His voice informs you that he
knows not sorrow ; for he whistles as he goes
along ; and every now and then, beguiles the
length of the road by some favourite ditty.
And when he has performed his task up to the
chimney's top, he crows there, like the morning
cock, to tell us all is right, and that we our-
selves ought to be stirring.

The little sweep is the gnat, to which I
alluded in the beginning of this paper. I
meddle not with the camel. The celebrated
Mr. Ferrand has already taken it in hand. But
is there no danger nor difficulty in ascending a

84 NEW CHIMNEY-SWEEPING ACT.

chimney ? No : none at all for a minor, but
much for an adult. Still our enlightened
senators allow the ascent to an adult, but deny
it to a minor. Sapient distinction ! worthy of
the present march of intellect. Its nullity with
regard to adults, puts one in mind of Matthews,
in his military review of American conscripts.
" Shoulder arms : — those who have umbrellas
may use them ; those who have none, need not."
Sweep the chimneys ; — those, who can get up
them, — must not : — those, who cannot, — may.

But then, a flue may be too strait, and
little Blacky will perish in it. Granted. The
case is of very rare occurrence. Still it may
take place. Are we to cease going to sea, because
some crazy vessel has consigned her crew to the
roaring waves ? Having few or no coaches left
on the highways, are we to stay at home,
because the monopolising railroad every now
and then makes minced meat of our bodies ?

But the climbing boy may have a sordid and
a cruel master. Even so. Public opinion would
tend to make the tyrant mend his manners,
and the law would pull him up. Bad masters
may be found in other places, as well as in the
chimney-nook. I am no politician ; still, if I

NEW CHIMNEY-SWEEPING ACT. 85

may judge of Whig and Tory by their own
mutual recriminations in the Senate House, I
should say, that poor Britannia is worse off for
bad masters than any young sweep in the land.
He may get redress, but she cannot ; for her
rulers, Hke the Hanoverian rat, have got pos-
session of the land ; and there is no chance of
driving them away, or of cvu:bing their love of
plunder.

I am not one of those who see much hardship
in the healthy profession of a chimney-sweep ;
I had rather be one than be a village tailor, or
a cloacina-man, or a tax-gatherer. When 1
was a lad in the nursery, had I been allowed, I
should have liked no better fun, than to have
had an occasional spree with the little black
fellow up the chimney.

Let us now look at the new Chimney-sweep-
ing Act in its immediate bearings upon society
at large.

Young master sweep, no longer allowed by
law to follow up his wonted profession, is put
to his shifts, in order to gain his daily bread.
He tries the factory ; there, he certainly ex-
changes his shining black face for a pale and

00 NEW CHIMNEY-SWEEPING ACT.

livid white one. A crowded room, and an
over-heated atmosphere throw him off his food.

No longer he breathes the fresh air, or hears
the skylark's morning carol. Feeble and un-
nerved, he abandons his new trade, and seeks
some other service. Cloacina's nightly agent
engages him ; and the poor lad is doomed to
work hard in a line of business, as low and ab-
horrent as his former one was high and agree-
able. Not reKshing this (and no wonder), he
sighs for the purer air of his former calling.
But an act of ParKament prevents his being
engaged. In despair, he turns vagabond. At
last, the constable introduces him to the magis-
trate, and the magistrate to the treadmill for
three months.

Our houses already begin to suffer for the
loss of their late useful and healthy little
climbers. The new sweeping apparatus is
found to be utterly inefficient, and even detri-
mental in its operation ; for, on reaching the
chimney-top, it is apt to knock off the pot, and
will sometimes bring a lot of bricks down the
chimney.

Chimney-tops at best are generally in bad
order. There seems to be an everlasting

NEW CHIMNEY-SWEEPING ACT. 87

struggle betwixt the hot and cold air to injm-e
the work of the mason. Some years ago, I had
a fair opportunity in London of viewing the
chimney-tops, from the elevated place where I
stood ; and I perceived them to be much out
of repair as far as the eye could reach.

The round form of the new sweeping ma-
chine renders it unfit to come in contact with
the angles of the chimney. Hence the soot
will remain in them ; and on the weather being
damp, especially when there is a high wind and
no fire in the grate, an extraordinary and disa-
greeable smell will pervade the apartment.

Under the existing Act of Parliament, there
will be no remedy but patience for this unne-
cessary nuisance, which mistaken philanthropy
has most unfortunately inflicted upon us.

To be sure, some courageous souls might
escape it by causing their chimneys to be
swept in the same manner in which our worthy
ancestors had caused theirs to be swept for cen-
turies long gone by. But then, the Act and
its penalties are staring them in the face, and it
is perilous in the extreme to transgress an Act
of Parliament, be it ever so preposterous in its
nature, when many hungry beings are interested
e 4

88 COMBAT BETWIXT TWO HARES.

in the transgression. Woe to him who allows
a minor sweep to ascend his chimney. The
informer is on the look out with an eye as
sharp as that of the lynx. The magistrate's
clerk has his pen already in the inkstand. The
constable is itching to serve the warrant, whilst
the town's attorney makes sure of a job, which
will enable him to sweep away the contents of
our breeches pockets with surprising skill and
accuracy.

ANECDOTE OF A COMBAT BETWIXT TWO
HARES.

" At last the two stout hares did meet
Like quarry of great might,
Like lions moved, they laid on load,
And made a cruel fight."

Chevy Chace.

On Easter Sunday, in the afternoon, as I
was proceeding with my brother-in-law, Mr.
Carr, to look at a wild-duck's nest in an ad-
jacent wood, we saw two hares fighting with
inconceivable fury on the open ground, about
a hundred and fifty yards distant from us.

COMBAT BETWIXT TWO HARES. bi)

They stood on their hinder legs like two bull-
dogs resolutely bent on destruction.

Having watched them for about a quarter of
an hour, we then entered the wood ; — I observ-
ing to Mr. Carr that we should find them en-
gaged on our return.

We staid in the wood some ten minutes, and
on leaving it, we saw the hares still in desperate
battle. They had moved along the hill side,
and the grass was strongly marked with their
down for a space of twenty yards. At last, one
of the sylvan warriors fell on its side, and never
got upon its legs again. Its antagonist then
retreated for a yard or so, — stood still for a
minute, as if in contemplation, and then rushed
vengefuUy on the fallen foe. This retreat and
advance was performed many times ; — the con-
queror striking its prostrate adversary with its
fore feet, and clearing off great quantities of
down with them.

In the mean time, the vanquished hare rolled
over and over again, but could not recover the
use of its legs, although it made several attempts
to do so. Its movements put you in mind of a
drunken man trying to get up from the floor,
after a hard night in the ale-house. It now
lay still on the ground, effectually subdued ;

90 COMBAT BETWIXT TWO HARES.

whilst the other contmued its attacks upon it,
with the fury of a little demon. Seeing that
the fight was over, we approached the scene of
action, — the conqueror hare retiring as we
drew near.

I took up the fallen combatant just as it was
breathing its last. Both its sides had been
completely bared of fur, and large patches of
down had been torn from its back and belly.
It was a well-conditioned buck hare, weighing,
I should suppose, some seven or eight pounds.
Mr. Carr's groom was standing by the stable
door, as I came up with the hare in my hand.
Here, John, said I, take this to your own house,
and get your wife to dress it for your family ;
— it is none the worse for being killed on
Easter Sunday : — and then I told him how it
had come into my possession. He thanked me
kindly for it ; and I learnt from Mr. Carr at
the end of the week, that John's wife had made
it into a pie, with the addition of a few rashers
of bacon ; — that it proved to be uncommonly
good ; — and that they would all remember, for
many years to come, the fight betwixt the two
hares in the park at Walton Hall, on Easter
Sunday afternoon, the 16th of April, 1843.

WREN, HEDGE-SPARROW, AND ROBIN. 91

THE WREN, THE HEDGE-SPARROW, AND
THE ROBIN.

The song of these three well-known warblers
may be termed perennial. Formerly it was
very rare for me to hear the notes of the second,
whilst the storms of winter raged through this
little valley. But now, it is otherwise ; for the
yew shrubs, which have grown up into a
spacious cover, seem to be more congenial to
the habits of the hedge-sparrow than any other
evergreen ; and it may be seen perched near
the top of these, and warbling there, from
time to time, in every month of the year.

As I am not yet a convert to the necessity
or advantage of giving to many of our British
birds the new and jaw-breaking names which
appear on the page of modern ornithology, I
will content myself with the old nomenclature,
so well-known to every village lad throughout
the land.

There is a problem to be solved in the eco-
nomy of these three soft-billed little birds,
before we can safely come to the conclusion.

92 THE WREN, THE HEDGE-SPARROW,

that severity of climate, and want of food, are
the real causes why our summer birds of pas-
sage leave us shortly after the sun has gone down
into the southern hemisphere. Like them, the
wren, the hedge-sparrow, and the robin, are in-
sectivorous, and they differ not in the texture
of their plumage ; still, they do not accompany
their departing congeners, but prefer to remain
in this cold and stormy quarter of the world,
throughout the whole of the year. They may
certainly suffer more or less, during the chilling
period of frost and snow ; nevertheless, their
breed is always kept up ; and we find, on the
return of spring, that they have not suffered
more than others which are apparently better
suited to brave the rigour of an English winter
than they are.

There is yet another point which wants set-
tling in the habits of these birds. I allude to
their song. When we are informed that incu-
bation is the main inducement to melody in
the feathered tribe, we have only to step out
after sunrise into the surrounding evergreens,
and there we are sure to hear either the wren,
the hedge-sparrow, or the robin, in fine song,
although not a single twig has been laid, or a

AND THE ROBIN. 93

piece of moss produced in furtherance of a nest,
wherein to raise their future young. Certainly,
in this case, neither love nor warmth could have
had any hand in tuning the winter lyre of these
little sons of Orpheus.

It now and then happens that we are led
astray by our own feelings when we pronounce
judgment on the actions of irrational animals.
There is a pretty good proof of this in the
story which we have of the American Polecat. —
On being told that this ill-scented animal dis-
charges a " fluid given him by Nature as a
defence," I cannot refrain from asking, by
what power of intuition the polecat is con-
vinced that a smell, naturally agreeable to
itself, is absolutely intolerable to man ? Did
birds and beasts speak an intelligible language,
as they are said to have done in the days of
Ovid, we should get at their true history with
greater ease ; and our ornithology would be
much more free from the romance which at
present pervades if.

The wren is at once distinguished in ap-
pearance from our smaller British songsters by
the erect position of its tail. Its restlessness,
too, renders it particularly conspicuous ; for.

94 THE WREN, THE HEDGE-SPARROW,

when we look at it, we find it so perpetually on
the move, that I cannot recollect to have ob-
served this diminutive rover at rest on a branch
for three minutes in continuation. Its habits
are solitary to the fullest extent of the word ;
and it seems to bear hard weather better than
either the hedge-sparrow or the robin ; for
whilst these two birds approach our habitations
in quest of food and shelter, with their plumage
raised as indicative of cold, the wren may be
seen in ordinary pursuit, amid icicles which hang
from the bare roots of shrubs and trees, on the
banks of the neighbcfuring rivulets; and amongst
these roots, it is particularly fond of building
its oval nest.

The ancients called the wren, Troglodytes ;
but it is now honoured with the high-sounding
name of Anorthura ; alleging for a reason, that
the ancients were quite mistaken in their sup-
position that this bird was an inhabitant of
caves, as it is never to be seen within them.
Methinks that the ancients were quite right, —
and that our modern masters in ornithology are
quite wrong. If we only for a moment reflect,
that the nest of the wren is spherical, and is of
itself, as it were, a little cave, we can easily

AND THE ROBIN. 95

imagine that the ancients, on seeing the bird
going in and out of this artificial cave, con-
sidered the word Troglodytes an appropriate
appellation.

The habits of the hedge-sparrow are not
quite so solitary as those of the wren. It will
approach the window in cold weather, and there
pick up a scanty meal with the robin, the chaf-
finch and the house-sparrow. Still, we very
rarely see three hedge-sparrows in company.
As these birds inhabit low shrubs and the bot-
toms of hawthorn fences, and are ever on the stir
amid old pieces of wood and lumber, put apart
for the use of the farm yard, we cannot be sur-
prised that they, as well as the robin and the
wren, which are fond of such localities, should
fall an easy prey to the cat, the weasel, the
foumart, and Hanoverian rat, which last all
the world knows to be uncommonly ravenous.
To these plunderers, we may possibly attribute
the cause why, from year to year, there is no
apparent increase in the number of these lowly
winter-songsters, be the protection afforded
them ever so great.

I have a Tom-cat here of surprising size and
beauty. He would have swung long ago, on

96 THE WREN, THE HEDGE-SPARROW,

account of liis well-known depredations amongst
these birds, had it not been that he is an
universal favourite with the household, and par-
ticularly caressed by the ladies for his engaging
manners. It is supposed, and with too much
reason, that he murdered two fine cock phea-
sants only a week ago. Indeed, I had no
doubt in my own mind but that he was the
real culprit, although a stranger cat was taken
up at the time, and hanged for the offence.
My conscience rebuked me for partiality on
that occasion ; and I felt that I had done wrong.
But it was only an affair with a cat: and I
trust that the public will overlook it, when we
reflect that, only the other day, in Dublin, a
high dignitary of the law did exhibit such pal-
pable partiality in a cause of " Victoria versus
Repeal," that he ought to have been unwigged
there and then, and banished for ever from
that arena of marked injustice to poor ould
Ireland, and her patriot sons.

We are still in uncertainty, and probably
must ever remain so, concerning the story of
the newly hatched cuckoo in the nest of the
hedge-sparrow.

It is an undisputed fact in natural history

AND THE ROBIN. 97

that the cuckoo, like some of our own species,
has a clever knack at freeing itself from the
duty of providing for its own offspring. Tliis
bird is notoriously partial to the homestead of
the hedge-sparrow ; and thus many a poor
hedge-sparrow is saddled with the care and ex-
pense of rearing the young of an alien, whose
manners and customs are totally different from
those of her own tribe. We learn from the
story in question, that a young cuckoo, the day
after it was hatched, contrived to get a yomig
hedge-sparrow (which was in the same nest
with itself) on its back, and proceeded with it,
stern foremost, up the side of the nest ; and, on
arriving at the summit, jerked its load into the
hedge below. The performance of such a feat
is impossible. At that period of existence, the
legs of the young cuckoo could not support
the weight of its own. body, to say nothing
of the additional load of another upon that
body. Again, the supposed act was quite con-
trary to any instinct with which the young
cuckoo might have been endowed; for, had
not the old bird been frightened away, she
would have been sitting on the two young ones
at the time in which the feat was said to have
H

98 THE WREN, THE HEDGE-SPARROW,

tciken place ; and her covering them would
have totally prevented such a movement on the
part of either of them. The whole narrative
is confused, and wants explanation.

The last of this sweetly warbling trio, whose
habits I am attempting to describe, is pretty
cock-robin, the delight of our childhood, and
an object of protection in our riper years.
Wherever there is plenty of shelter for him, his
song may be heard throughout the entire year,
even in the midst of frost and snow. In the
whole catalogue of British birds, cock-robin is
the only one, which in his wild state can be
really considered familiar with man. Others
are rendered tame by famine and cold weather,
and will cautiously approach the spot where
food is thrown for them ; but the robin will ac-
tually alight upon your table, and pick up
crumbs on your own plate. When I have been
digging in the pleasure-ground, he has come
and sat upon my spade ; and by every gesture
proved his confidence. You cannot halt for
any moderate time in the wood, but cock-robin
is sure to approach, and cheer you with an in-
ward note or two ; and on such occasions he
has more than once alighted on mv foot. This

AND THE ROBIN. 99

familiarity is inherent in him, and not acquired.
I am not acquainted with any other wild bird
that possesses it.

In Italy this social disposition of his does
not guarantee him from destruction by the
hand of man. At the bird-market near the
Rotunda in Rome, I have counted more than
fifty robin-redbreasts lying dead on one stall.
" Is it possible," said I to the vender, " that you
can kill and eat these pretty songsters ? " "Yes,"
said he, with a grin ; " and if you vAYi. take a
dozen of them home for your dinner to-day,
you will come back for two dozen to-morrow."

It is the innocent familiarity of this sweet
warbler which causes it to be such a favourite
with all ranks of people in England. Nobody
ever thinks of doing it an injury. " That's
poor cock-robin ! — don't hurt poor cock-robin,"
says the nursery maid, when her infant charge
would wish to capture it. Mrs. Barbauld has
introduced cock-robin into her plaintive story
of Pity; and when we study the habits of
this bird, and see that his intimacy with us far
surpasses that of any other known wild one, we
no longer wonder that the author of that pa-
thetic ballad TJie Children in the Wood should

100 THE ROBIN.

have singled out the red-breast amongst all the
feathered tribe, to do them the last sad act of
kindness. They had been barbarously left to
perish, and had died of cold and want. Cock-
robin found them ; and he is described as
bringing leaves in his mouth, and covering
their dead bodies with them.

" Their pretty lips with black-berries
Were all besmeared and dyed ;
And when they saw the darksome night,
They laid them down and cried.

" No burial these pretty babes
Of any man receives,
Till robin-redbreast, painfully.
Did cover them with leaves."

This ballad has something in it peculiarly cal-
culated to touch the finest feelings of the
human heart. Perhaps, there is not a village
or hamlet in England that has not heard what
befel the babes in the wood ; and how poor
cock-robin did all in his power for them when
death had closed their eyes. I wish it were in
my power to do only half as much in favour of
some other birds, as this well-known ballad of
The Children in the Wood has done for poor
cock-robin.

WASTE LANDS. 101

WASTE LANDS.

Ornithology, when divested of hard names
and a crabbed system, is an easy and a pleasant
study. Formerly, there were abundant oppor-
tunities of enjoying this fascinating pursuit on
the common lands which our provident ancestors
had set apart for the use of the public in every
town and village of England. As these common
lands, by a most ill-judged policy, became pri-
vate property, the field naturalist was robbed
of his rights with the rest of his fellow-towns-
men. If the present rage for enclosures shall
continue to receive the countenance of our
Parliament, we may soon bid adieu for ever to
the valuable privileges which the waste lands of
England have hitherto afforded to the public.

In . my own immediate neighbourhood there
still remains a spacious common for the public
good. It is beautiful in nature's wildest charms.
On the lower part of it there is a noble extent
of gorse or whins, not " unprofitably gay " to
the ardent naturalist ; for he has it in his
power to come hither and enjoy the sight of

102 WASTE LANDS.

many species of British birds, some of which
are not to be found in the enclosed lands of
the neighbourhood. As there is now a plan
on foot to procure an Act of Parliament for the
enclosure of this sweet common, I have caused
to be printed, and to be distributed gratis, a
few observations to put the public on their
guard. The good people of Wakefield have
expressed themselves highly satisfied with my
feeble attempt to serve their cause.

As natural history is too much interested not
to put her veto to the proposed enclosure, I
make bold to oiFer to the public at large my
recent little publication, with a faint hope that
it may operate in some degree to retard the
encloslire of the few commons which still re-
main to us. Every enclosure of such lands is
a serious loss to the field naturalist, who has
no land of his own whereon to correct the
errors which he will unavoidably imbibe in his
researches for information within the precincts
of his own closet.

"heath common.

" Wakefield, — once Merry Wakefield ! — why

art thou so no longer ? What envious hand

WASTE LANDS. 103

liath smote thee, and changed thy garland of
roses into one of rue and wormwood ? For-
merly thy fair face must have beamed with
many smiles ; for thou wert known through-
out the land, by the name of ' Merry Wake-
field.'

" And very merry must have been thy days:
for thy merchants were prosperous, thy peo-
ple happy, and thy prison empty ; ay, so empty,
that time was when not one single captive
could be found within its walls. There was
Westgate Common open to thy people and to
all the world besides, and the Outwood too ;
and here it was that thy merry sons and daugh-
ters came to dance, and sing, and to drive dull
care away. But these once-famed rural haunts
for mirth and glee are now no longer thine:
the iron hand of private interest fell heavy on
them ; and they were lost to thee for ever.
Oh, how cruel and unjust it was, to sever from
thee those delightful walks which the foresight
and good sense of our ancestors had apportioned
for thy welfare and left at thy command !

" All, all is now changed for the worse : and
sad and sorrowful have the scenes become,
which were once so bright and joyous: and

104 WASTE LANDS.

woful is the appearance of the avenues which
lead to once Merry Wakefield.

" On one of them there frowns a Bastile so
huge and terrible, and so appalling with solitary
cells, that in viewing it the soul of man recoils
within him, and he begins to doubt if he is in
a Christian country. Things were not so in
the gone-by days of once Merry Wakefield.

" On another is seen a widely spreading
structure, peopled by those whom sorrow, and
misfortune, and want, and wretchedness, have
deprived of the choicest gift of Heaven to man.
We read in their countenances the mourn-
ful history of their sad destiny, and we fancy
that we can hear them say, ' You would have
seen no sights so sorrowful as these in the
gone-by days of once merry Wakefield.'

" On a third avenue we behold unsightly piles
of buildings, — granaries high and spacious, —
but the workings of which are diametrically the
reverse of those erected by benevolent Joseph
in ancient Egypt. And in passing over Calder's
Bridge, we see a gem of olden architecture,
now mouldering into dust, unheeded and unte-
nanted, and with its windows broken. 'Tis
said to have been endowed for mass, for the

WASTE LANDS. 105

souls of the slain at the great battle in the
neighbourhood. Some years ago it served as
a counting-house ; but probably the pressure
of the times drove the buyers and sellers from
its polluted vralls, which were kept so pure and
bright in the gone-by days of once Merry
Wakefield.

" Wakefield, — once Merry Wakefield ! —
these sad innovations too plainly tell us that all is
not right within thee. But thy cup of sorrow
is not yet filled up ; another bereavement
still awaits thee, and it will be a final blow
to the few remaining rural sports which are
now within thy reach. Heath Common is to
be enclosed ! Then adieu, a long and last adieu,
to thy delightful walks, and rides, and manly
games, on the ever-enchanting wilds of Heath
Common ; thy unrestricted, undisturbed so-
journ, time out of mind. And when the fatal
day of its enclosure shall have dawned upon
thee, say, once Merry Wakefield say, what is
to become of thy fifteen thousand people, who
will not have a yard of public land remaining,
whereon to recover that health of frame, and
vigour of the mind, so apt to be enfeebled when
debarred from the advantag-e of rural air and

106 WASTE LANDS.

pastime ? I myself will join thee in thy lament-
ations on the near approach of this great and
unexpected event ; for many a walk do I take
on Heath Common, to hear the wild notes of
birds which are strangers to my own domain ;
and it is on Heath Common that I always
expect to hear the first song of the cuckoo,
sweet harbinger of returning spring.

« Were I a Senator, — which God forbid,
whilst Peel's Oath stares me in the face! — I
would stand up and fight thy battle to the
last

" Wakefield, — once Merry Wakefield ! — fare
thee well ! I would not have a hand in the
projected enclosure of Heath Common, even
though poor Charley Stuart himself could come
back, and were to give his royal sanction to
it."*

* Wakefield had acquired the association with its name of
" Merry" at an early period, and it may be that the exhibition
of these very pageantries may have had much to do with the
origin of the expression which is put by Fuller amongst the
provincial expressions of Yorkshire, " Merry Wakefield."
(See preface, p. xvL, to the Towneley Mysteries, published in
London by J. B. Nichols and Son, Parliament Street, and
William Pickering, Chancery Lane.

THE CANADA GOOSE. 107

THE CANADA OR CRAVAT GOOSE.

" Mopso Nisa datur, quid non speremus amantes ? "

Virgil.

The fine proportions of this stately foreigner, its
voice, and flavour of its flesh, are strong induce-
ments for us all to hope that, ere long, it will be-
come a naturalised bird throughout the v^hole
of Great Britain. I stop not to give a detailed
description of its plumage ; that has already
been performed by many able hands. Suffice
it then to say, that its beautiful black neck and
white cheeks render it so particularly conspi-
cuous, that those who have seen it once will
never be at a loss to recognise it, when viewed
amongst all other species of the goose tribe.

Towards the close of the last century, thirteen
of these birds were to be seen on this sheet of
water. My father had taken the precaution to
have them pinioned, in order to insure their
permanent stay with him ; and they were known
by no other name than that of Spanish Geese.
After my father's death, and during my absence

108 THE CANADA GOOSE.

in America, some hungry quadruped, or noc-
turnal plunderer in the shape of man, thinned
down their number to a solitary goose ; and at
last, this remaining favourite fell a prey to the
fox, ere all entrance into my park had been
effectually debarred to that wily villain by the
interposition of a wall, from nine to ten feet in
height.

No more Canada geese were seen at this place
for many years, until one day, when Mr. Ord,
of Philadelphia, the elegant biographer of poor
Wilson the ornithologist, observed a pair of
them to alight on a distant part of the lake.
I shall never forget with what joy and enthu-
siasm this worthy friend announced to me his
important discovery of the long-looked-for
strangers. But they only tarried for a day or
two, and then they went away, and returned no
more.

In the winter of the following year, I was
agreeably surprised one morning by seeing a
flock of four-and-twenty Canada geese on the
water. Having never heard that so large a
number had been observed on any of the waters
in this neighbourhood, I concluded that these
birds must have come from a distance. Be this

THE CANADA GOOSE. 109

as it may, they seemed satisfied with the se-
curity which the place afforded ; and they took
up their permanent abode amongst us, reserving
to themselves, however, the privilege of making
excursionary visits to the several ornamental
pools of water in the surrounding district. One
of these geese seems not to be thoroughly bred,
as it wants the jet black collar on the neck ;
and it has not that well-defined portion of white
on the cheeks, so conspicuous in the others. It
appears more suspicious than the rest of the
flock ; for, on a too near approach of the spec-
tator, it is invariably the first to give mouth, and
the first to rise on the wing.

When I reflect on the numbers of enemies,
bipeds as well as quadrupeds, with which birds
of this description are beset, I often marvel
how it is possible that they are able to perform
their repeated aerial wanderings, without falling
a prey to the dangers which must continually
await them. T know to a certainty that this
flock has been shot at by prowlers in the neigh-
bourhood, but hitherto without success.

In the breeding season, two or three pairs
will remain here. The rest take themselves
ofi", and are seen no more till the return of

110 THE CANADA GOOSE.

autumn, when they re-appear, without any ad-
dition to the flock, or diminution of it. This is
much to be wondered at; and I would fain
hazard a conjecture that their young may pos-
sibly be captured in the place where they have
been hatched, and then pinioned to prevent
escape. But, after all, this is mere speculation.
We know nothing of the habits of our birds of
passage when they are absent from us ; and we
cannot account how it comes to pass that the
birds just mentioned invariably return to this
country without any perceptible increase of
numbers ; or, if the original birds die or are
destroyed, why it is that the successors arrive
here in the same numbers as their predecessors.
Geese and swans may be taken without any
difficulty about a fortnight after the sun has
entered the tropic of Cancer. At that period,
the large feathers of the vnng drop oiF, and a
month must elapse before the new ones arrive
at a state of sufficient maturity to bear away
the bird in flight. Two years ago, six of my
Canadians, having determined to stay here
during the summer, I watched them narrowly
at the time of moulting ; but they seemed so
aware of their helpless state, that they never

THE CANADA GOOSE. Ill

Strayed far enough from the water's edge to
allow us to place ourselves betwixt it and them.
At length I effected my purpose by a stratagem,
and secured them.

There can be nothing more enlivening to
rural solitude than the trumpet-sounding notes
of the Canada Goose. They may be heard here
at most hours of the day, and often during the
night. But spring is the time at which these
birds are most vociferous. Then it is that they
are on the wing, moving in aerial circles round
the mansion, — now rising aloft, now dropping
into the water, with such notes of apparent joy
and revelry as cannot fail to attract the attention
of those who feel an interest in contemplating
Nature's wildest scenery.

Somel;iow or other it has unfortunately been
my lot through life to pay smartly for my
little researches in Natural History, when
business or inclination have brought me back
to the shores of my native country. The former
zeal-subduing affair at Liverpool will not be
unknown to those who shall have read the
Wanderings ; and latterly at Hull, through the
pig-headedness of a subaltern Custom-House
officer, and the haughty demeanour of another

112 THE CANADA GOOSE.

in a higher station of the same establishment,
my ornithological views were frustrated, and I
may say, I lost at one go, my time, my patience,
and my money. You shall see how this hap-
pened. Having purchased two pairs of Bernacle
geese, and four wigeons at Rotterdam, I got
them put into a hamper, and I took them with
me on board the vessel which steams weekly
betwixt that town and the port of Hull. We
had a charming passage, short and smooth ; and
on our arrival in the Humber, I informed the
visiting Custom-House officer that I had four
geese and four wigeons in the hamper which
stood before him. " They must go to the
Custom House," said he. " I know they must,"
said I, "if they were dead geese for the pur-
pose of commerce. But they are Kving geese,"
continued I, " and of course exempt by law from
such an unpleasant errand." " No matter," said
he obstinately ; " to the Custom House they must
and shall go, alive or dead." And to the Custom
House they went on a truck without springs,
trotting all the way over the rough pavement
into the heart of the town of Hull. On our
arrival at the Custom House, another officer, in
a harsh tone of voice, asked me why I had

THE CANADA GOOSE. 113

brought living geese to that place. " By per-
emptory orders," said I, " from the visiting
Custom-House officer in the river." " He is a
booby," said this officer : " let these geese be
removed, they don't pay duty." My geese and
wigeons were instantly withdrawn from his
haughty presence, and they had another jolting
through the streets of Hull to the water side, with
some fears on my part that they would not forget
in a hurry their being jumbled together so rudely
in the performance of a useless expedition.

We steamed up the Humber, and reached
Walton Hall late that night. The Bernacle gan-
ders had borne their journey well ; but it was
otherwise with the two geese and three of the
wigeons. They appeared out of sorts, and died
in the course of the following week.* The two
surviving ganders, being bereft of their connu-
bial comforters, seemed to take their misfortune
sorely to heart for some time, till at last they
began to make advances for permission to enter
into the company of the Canadian geese. These
good birds did not hesitate to receive them ;

* Perhaps their death might have been accelerated by the
act of pinioning them, although it seemed to have had no bad
effect on the ganders.

114 THE CANADA GOOSE.

and from that time to this the two very distinct
species of geese (the one being only half the
size of the other) have become one inseparable
family. The two Bernacles, being pinioned,
cannot of course accompany the Canadians in
their wonted peregrinations through the country.
But they remain in unalterable alliance and
friendship with five other Canadians, which, with
themselves, have undergone a similar process of
losing part of the wing, to prevent their depar-
ture from home.

On my return from Italy in the autumn of
1841, the keeper informed me that, in the pre-
ceding spring, one of the little Bernacle gan-
ders, accompanied by an old Canadian goose,
had come on the island where the mansion
sta^jds, and formed a kind of nest on the border
of a flower-bed near the boat-house ; that the
female had laid five eggs in it, and that all these
eggs had turned out addle. I could easily com-
prehend the latter part of his information rela-
tive to the eggs : but had he told me that the
income tax is a blessing, and that the national
debt is an honour to the country, I could more
readily have believed him, than that a Canada
goose had been fool enough to unite herself

i

THE CANADA GOOSE. 115

with a Bernacle gander. Nevertheless, the
man persisted stoutly in what he had affirmed,
and I told the story to others, and nobody
believed me.

In the breeding season, however, of 1842,
this diminutive gander and magnificent goose
appeared on the island ; and as the spot which
they had occupied on the preceding year was
very bleak and quite unsheltered, I thought
that I could offer them a more commodious
situation.

Just opposite the eastern windows of the
sitting-room, and two-and-twenty yards distant
from them, there is yet alive the remnant of a
once superb and fertile blackheart cherry-tree.
It was evidently past its prime in the days of
my early youth ; but I can well remember that
it then bore ponderous loads of dainty cherries.
This cherry-tree, like the hand that is now
writing a description of it, appears the worse
for wear ; and the wintry blasts of more than
half a century have too clearly proved that
neither its internal vigour, nor the strength of
its gigantic limbs, could make an effectual stand
against the attacks of such sturdy antagonists.
Its north-western and north-eastern parts have

116 THE CANADA GOOSE.

gradually died away, and what remains alive of
it to the southward can no longer produce fruit
to be compared with that of gone-by periods.
The bole, too, which measures full ten feet and
five inches in circumference at the graft, seems
to show signs of Time's hard usage. Perhaps
in a few years more a south-western gale, which
often does much damage here, may lay it low in
ruins. Close to this venerable tree I niade a
hollow in the ground, about the size of an
ordinary coal-basket, and filled it with hay.
The geese soon took possession of it ; and on
the third day after they had occupied it, the
female laid an egg in it. She ultimately sat
on five, and they all proved addle.

Last year this incongruous though persevering
couple visited the island again, and proceeded
with the work of incubation in the same place,
and upon hay which had been purposely re-
newed. Nothing could exceed the assiduity
with which the little Bernacle stood guard,
often on one leg, over his bulky partner, day
after day, as she was performing her tedious
task. If any body approached the place, his
cackling was incessant : he would run at him
with the fury of a turkey-cock ; he would jump

THE CANADA GOOSE. 117

up at his knees, and not desist in his aggres-
sions until the intruder had retired. There
was something so remarkably disproportionate
betwixt this goose and gander, that I gave to
this the name of Mopsus, and to that the name
of Nisa ; and I would sometimes ask the splendid
Canadian Nisa, as she sat on her eggs, how she
could possibly have lost her heart to so di-
minutive a little fellow as Bernacle Mopsus,
when she had so many of her own comely species
present, from which to choose a happy and
efficient partner.

The whole afikir appeared to be one of ridicule
and bad taste ; and I was quite prepared for a
termination of it, similar to that of the two
preceding years, when behold ! to my utter
astonishment, out came two young ones, the
remainder of the five eggs being addle.

The vociferous gesticulations and strutting of
little Mopsus were beyond endurance, when he
first got sight of bis long-looked-for progeny.
He screamed aloud, whilst Nisa helped him to
attack me with their united wings and hissings
as I approached the nest in order to convey
the little ones to the water ; for the place at
which the old birds were wont to get upon the

118 THE CANADA GOOSE.

island lay at some distance, and I preferred to
launch them close to the cherry-tree, which done,
the parents immediately jumped down into the
water below, and then swam off with them to
the opposite shore. This loving couple, ap-
parently so ill-assorted and disproportionate,
has brought up the progeny with great care
and success. It has now arrived at its full
growth, and is in mature plumage.

These hybrids are elegantly shaped, but are
not so large as the mother, nor so small as the
father, their plumage partaking in colour with
that of both parents. The white on their front
is only half as much as that which is seen on
the front of the gander, whilst their necks are
brown in lieu of the coal-black colour which
appears on the neck of the goose. Their
breasts, too, are of a dusky colour, whilst the
breast of the Bernacle is black, and that of the
Canadian white ; and throughout the whole of
the remaining plumage, there may be seen an
altered and modified colouring not to be traced
in that of the parent birds.

I am writing this in the middle of February.
In a fortnight or three weeks more, as the
breeding season approaches, perhaps my httle

THE CANADA GOOSE. 119

Mopsus and his beauteous Nisa may try their
luck once more, at the bole of the superannuated
cherry-tree. I shall have all in readiness, and
shall be glad to see them.

I certainly acted rashly, notwithstanding ap-
pearances, in holding this faithful couple up to
the ridicule of visitors v^^ho accompanied me to
the spot where the novel incubation was going
on. I have had a salutary lesson, and shall be
more guarded for the future in giving an opinion.
Information is always desirable, and is doubly
satisfactory when accompanied by a demonstra-
tion. Nine times out of ten, that, from the close
is to be preferred to that from the closet. In
the present instance, my speculation that a
progeny could not be produced from the union
of a Bernacle gander with a Canada goose has
utterly failed. I stand convinced by a hybrid,
reprimanded by a gander, and instructed by a
goose.

l4

120 THE DOMESTIC SWAN.

THE DOMESTIC SWAN. ^

" Carmina jam moriens canit exequialia cygnus. "

Ovid.

In the whole catalogue of British birds there is
not one to be found more graceful and majestic
than our common domestic swan. With me it
is a particular favourite. Being quite out of
harm's way, my swans become much tamer than
they are wont to be at other places ; and as
every window of the house bears upon the
water which flows around the island, there is
the finest opportunity possible of observing the
habits of these birds, whose movements are so
ornamental to it, and so attractive to spectators.
The male and female are so alike in colour
and in plumage, that were it not for a trifling
difference in size, and in the red of the beak, it
would be a difficult task to distinguish the one
from the other. The snow-white feathers in
the wing receive additional beauty by the mus-
cular power which the swan possesses of raising
them without extending the wing itself. The
appearance of orange colour on the heads of

THE DOMESTIC SWAN. 121

swans is merely accidental, and is acquired when
the birds are searching for food with their heads
under water at the roots of sedges. The im-
pregnation is so strong that the feathers will
retain the colour for months ; and this has given
rise to the erroneous conjecture of its being
original.

Such is the power and size of the swan, that
our golden eagle itself will not dare to attack
it : much less chance, then, would the white-
headed eagle of the United States have in
a combat with it. If we can bring ourselves
to believe the modern assertion that a swan
spreads its legs in order to accelerate its flight,
we can easily conceive that, by some magic or
other, the eagle may be able to strike its talons
into the swan's heart, notwithstanding the bone
and the mass of muscle which obstruct access
to that deeply-seated organ. The fact is, no
bird in the world ever spreads its legs in order
to increase the velocity of its flight. Such an
act would have the very contrary effect. In
flight, the legs of birds (with very few excep-
tions) come quite up to the body. In some
the toes point forwards, in others backwards,
for obvious reasons ; and it is only when a bird

122 THE DOMESTIC SWAN.

is about to alight on land, or on the water, that
it stretches out its legs or spreads its webs;
and this is done to check the descent in order
that the body may escape from injury.

Many years ago I allowed one of my swans
the full use of both its wings, and great was the
gratification which its aerial evolutions afforded
me. Its powers of flight were truly astonishing.
It visited all the sheets of water for many miles
around ; and, being very tame, it would some-
times, on its return home, alight within a few
yards of me,* as I was standing near the margin
of the water. On taking its excursions into
the world at large, I would often say to it, in a
kindly tone of voice as it flew over my head,
" Qui amat periculum, peribit in illo ; " as I too
clearly foresaw that foes would lie in ambush
for it. At last, I missed my rash and pretty
favourite. It had taken wing to the westward
one fine morning, and that morning was its last.
I looked for its return in vain ; and every day
my hope grew weaker as my fears increased.
Towards the close of the week I read in the
Wakefield paper that a professional gentleman
in the neighbouring town of Horbury, had suc-
ceeded in shooting a magnificent wild swan,

THE DOMESTIC SWAN. 123

which had previously been observed in that
quarter. This made me suspect that my poor
swan had fallen by that identical shot, for I
never saw it more.

Were wild swans less persecuted on their
annual visit to the shores of Great Britain, we
should see much more of their habits than we
do at present. I once had a flock of fifty-two
real wild swans here. They seemed aware of
the protection afforded them, and they tarried
with me above a month. Six years after this
another flock sojourned on the lake for about a
week.

There is a peculiarity in the nidification of
tlie domestic swan too singular to be passed
over without notice. At the time that it lays
its first egg, the nest which it has prepared is of
a very moderate size ; but, as incubation pro-
ceeds, we see it increase vastly in height and
breadth. Every soft material, such as pieces of
grass and fragments of sedges, are laid hold of
by the sitting swan as they float within her
reach, and are added to the nest. This work
of accumulation is performed by her during the
entire period of incubation, be the weather wet
or dry, settled or unsettled ; and it is perfectly

12i THE DOMESTIC SWAN.

astonishing to see with what assiduity she plies
her work of aggrandisement to a nest already
sufficient in strength and size to answer every
end.

My swans generally form their nest on an
island quite above the reach of a flood, and still
the sitting bird never appears satisfied with the
quantity of materials which we provide for her
nest. I once gave her two huge bundles of
oaten straw, and she performed her work of
apparent supererogation by applying the whole
of it to her nest, already very large, and not
exposed to destruction, had the weather be-
come ever so rainy. This singular propensity,
amongst many others in the economy of birds,
puts speculation on our part quite out of the
question. We can no more account for this
seemingly unnecessary anxiety in the sitting
swan to augment the size of its nest, than we
can explain why the little long-tailed titmouse
invariably provides itself with a spherical nest,
warm as a winter's coat ; whilst a still more
delicate bird of passage from the hot countries
is content with one of hemispherical form, and so
scantily supplied with materials whereon to lay
its eggs, in this cold and changeable climate,

THE DOMESTIC SWAN. 125

that it is little better in appearance than one of
network composition.

Wliere swans are kept on a moderately-sized
sheet of water, the old ones, as spring ap-
proaches, begin to pursue their own brood with
a ferocity scarcely conceivable. It is an un-
ceasing pursuit, both night and day ; till at
last, the poor fugitives, worn out with exertion,
betake themselves to the land, where the un-
natural parents allow them to stay ; and then
desist from further persecution, until the young-
ones return to the water. To curb these ran-
corous proceedings on the part of the parent
birds, I cut through the web of their feet ; and
this at once diminished their powers of speed.
The young birds soon perceived the change
in their favour, and profited by it; for, on
finding that they could easily outswim their
pursuing parents, they set their fury at naught,
and kept out of their reach with very little
exertion.

Where the domestic swan is free from every
species of molestation, it becomes exceedingly
tame, and passes by far the greater part of its
time out of the water. Here no idle boys
molest the swans ; no petted dogs pursue them ;

126 THE DOMESTIC SWAN.

no guns alarm them, and no foxes prowl to
pounce upon them. Hence they are seen
walking to and fro in all parts of the park ;
and they will take the bread from your hand
with a familiarity that at once bespeaks their
unconsciousness of danger.

The supposed melody of the dying swan
seems to be a fable of remote antiquity. I
have long been anxious to find out upon what
grounds the ancients could possibly attach
melody to an expiring bird, which neither in
youth nor in riper years ever shows itself gifted
with the power of producing a single inflection
of the voice that can be pronounced melodious.

Ovid, no doubt, was well skilled in real
ornithology, for in every part of lus Metamor-
phoses we can trace some of the true habits of
birds, and often see their natural propensities
through the mystic veil which his poetical
fahcy had so dexterously placed before them.
Still the swan is an exception ; for there is
nothing whatever to be perceived in the entire
economy of this bird that can, by any turning
or tmsting, justify Ovid's remark, that it will
warble its own funereal song on the near ap-
proach of death.

THE DOMESTIC SWAN. 127

The transformation of Cycnus into a swan
is very entertaining : —

When Phaeton, the well-known incendiary,
had burnt down every corn-rick in mother
Earth's farm-yard, and placed her own beloved
person in danger of immediate suffocation,

" neque enim tolerare vaporem

Ulterius potuit,"

Jupiter felled him dead into the river Po ; a
somewhat milder punishment than if he had
sent him to Norfolk Island for life. His poor
sisters wept so intensely at having lost him
for ever, that they became trees, (probably
weeping wdllows), and actually took root in the
ground. His near relative, Cycnus, too, was so
stupefied at what had happened, that he could
no longer perform the duties of his royal sta-
tion. He left his throne and all its pleasures,
and became a voluntary wanderer on the banks
of that river into which the dead body of
Phaeton had fallen. Its banks and its trees,
some of which had so lately been Phaeton's
own sisters, resounded far and near with his
doleful lamentations. One morning, on awaking
from sleep, he found that he had lost his usual
voice, and that he could only squeak. Soon

128 THE DOMESTIC SWAN.

after this, his neck became wonderfully stretched
out ; webs grew betwixt his fingers, and feathers
sprouted out from beneath his flannel waistcoat.
In a few minutes more, his mouth had all the
appearance of a beak, and he actually became
a swan ; and to this day, he is seen to frequent
swamps and lakes, as being places the most
secure against fire, which had done such mis-
chief to his family.

" Stagna colit, patulosque lacus ; ignemque perosus,
Quae colat, elegit contraria flumina flammis,"

Once I had an opportunity, which rarely oc-
curs, of being with a swan in its last illness.
Although I gave no credence to the extravagant
notion which antiquity had entertained of
melody from the mouth of the dying swan,
still 1 felt anxious to hear some plaintive sound
or other, some soft inflection of the voice,
which might tend to justify that notion in a
small degree. But I was disappointed.

This poor swan was a great favourite, and
had been the pride of the lake time out of
mind. Those who spend their life in the
country, and pay attention to the ordinary
movements of birds, will easily observe a change
in them, whenever their health is on the de-

THE DOMESTIC SWAN. 129

cline. I perceived that the plumage of this
swan put on a weather-beaten appearance, and
that the bird itself no longer raised the feathers
of his wings, as he passed through the water
before me. Judging that he was unwell, I
gave orders that he should be suppKed with
bread and boiled potatoes. Of these he ate
sparingly, and in a day or two he changed his
quarters, probably for want of sufficient shelter
from the wind. Having found his way down
to the stables, he got upon a small fishpond
there, out of the reach of storms. From this
time he never fended for food, but he con-
tinued to take a little white bread now and
then from my hand. At last he refused this ;
and then he left the water for good and all, and
sat down on the margin of the pond, with
evident signs of near-approaching death. He
soon became too weak to support his long neck
in an upright position. He nodded, and then
tried to recover himself, and then nodded again,
and again held up his head ; till at last, quite
enfeebled and worn out, his head fell gently on
the grass, his wings became expanded a trifle
or so, and he died whilst I was looking on.
This was in the afternoon, and I had every

K

130 THE WINDHOVER HAWK,

facility of watching his departing hour, for I
was attending the masons, some thirty yards
from the pond to which the swan had retired.
He never even uttered his wonted cry, nor so
much as a sound, to indicate what he felt
within.

The silence which this bird maintained to
the last, tends to show that the dying song of
the swan is nothing but a fable, the origin of
which is lost in the shades of antiquity. Its
repetition can be of no manner of use, save as
a warning to ornithologists not to indulge in
the extravagances of romance, — a propensity
not altogether unknown in these our latter
times.

THE WINDHOVER HAWK, AND THE OIL-
GLAND.

On my return from Belgium, in the middle of
May, 1844, whilst perusing the seventeenth
number of the Zoologist, my attention was
particularly drawn to the excellent observations
of Mr. Bury, relative to the habits of the
kestril, or windhover hawk. I feel myself

AND THE OIL-GLAND. 131

under great obligations to this courteous gen-
tleman for the flattering manner in which he
has introduced my name. May I entertain the
hope that he will not be offended with me, if I
venture to disagree with him on one point
relative to what he has advanced on the habits
of the bird in question ?

He has quite satisfied me that the windhover
will now and then make a meal on the smaller
birds ; and this information on his part is very
acceptable to me, as I have no opportunity of
observing the windhover during the winter
months, for it leaves this immediate neighbour-
hood in October, and seldom returns before the
first week in February.

The conclusion of Mr. Bury, as to the use of
the oil-gland, is not quite so satisfactory. He
says, " And I plainly saw the bird press the
nipple with its beak, and rub the matter so
expressed on its feathers." This assertion
would have put the question at rest for ever
in my own mind, and I should willingly have
yielded the disputed palm to this intelligent
gentleman, had he not subsequently remarked,
*' I do not mean to say I ever saw the matter
expressed."

132 THE WINDHOVER HAWK,

Now, he ought to have seen the matter ex-
pressed. The bird was on his finger, '* under
a strong light," and this position afibrded him
the very best opportunity of seeing the matter,
which is an opaque and palpable substance, and
could not possibly have escaped the notice of
so keen an observer as Mr. Bury, had it really
been rubbed on the feathers, and even trans-
ferred, as he says, from the feathers of the
body to those of the head. I can assure him
that I have witnessed a favourite parrot press
its nipple scores of times, but I could never
detect the least moisture on the sides of its bill,
nor observe the smallest portion of matter on
the feathers which the bird was preening ;
hence I came to the conclusion that the parrot
had pressed the nipple, not to procure the
substance which it contained, but merely to
gratify itself by producing that pleasing sen-
sation which We ourselves experience when we
rub our dry hand over our face.

Again ; in most waterfowl, the oil-gland is
completely covered with a very thick tuft of
down, not moveable at pleasure, like the true
feathers. This tuft would prove an insur-
mountable obstacle to the transfer of matter

AND THE OIL-GLAND. 133

from the gland through the medium of the bill.
In fine, there are some birds without any gland
at all, as I have remarked elsewhere. Provi-
dence never does any thing by halves. If the
matter from the oil-gland were for the purpose
of lubricating the feathers, it would not have
been granted by the Creator to one bird, and
denied to another. Had such an act of par-
tiality taken place, " it would have been putting
one sadly over the head of another."

Some years ago, when I was in hot dispute
on this subject with vn-iters in Mr. Loudon's
Magazine of Natural History, a thunderstorm
provided me with the means of having a very
satisfactory view of the oil-gland on the rump
of a kestril, or windhover. The poor hawk was
sitting upon the branch of a sycamore tree,
when the lightning struck it dead to the
ground. It was a fine old male bird, and had
no outward marks of damage on it. I care-
fully dissected the oil-gland. Aroimd the base
of it there was a circle of down. The shaft of
the nipple was quite bare of down or feathers ;
but the orifice of the nipple was totally con-
cealed by a very dense tuft of down, which had
the exact appearance of a camel-hair brush.

134 ON THE FOOD OF ANIMALS.

Had this kestril's intention been ever so
ardent to lubricate its feathers with the con-
tents of its own oil-gland, the thing would have
been impossible, because the thick bunch of
down, on the very extremity of the nipple,
would have effectually impeded the transfer of
thj oil from the gland to the bill. Moreover,
the oil would have disfigured the down, had it
been expressed through the nipple ; and Mr.
Bury could not have failed to observe the
change which the oil would have made in the
appearance of the down itself. The tail and
oil-gland of this kestril are now on the table
before me.

ON THE FOOD OF ANIMALS.

" Carne ferae sedant jejunia, nee tamen omnes :
Quippe equus, et pecudes, armentaque, gramine vivunt."

Ovin,

On passing the terrestrial animals in review
before us, it would appear, that those which
go in flocks, are known to live upon the fruits
of the earth : and that those which shun the

ON THE FOOD OF ANIMALS. 135

society of their own species, contrive to main-
tain themselves by preying upon their fellow
creatures. Men are omnivorous, although the
old sapng of " fruges consumere nati," seenis
to imply, that they would not do wrong in ab-
staining from carnal food. This arrangement
is easily accounted for, seeing that the food of
gregarious animals is plentiful, whilst that of
solitary ones is comparatively scarce. Were
lions to hunt in companies, the captured quarry
would be insufficient for their appetites ; they
would fight for the slaughtered spoil ere they
had torn it in pieces, and the strongest would
be possessed of the prize.

We have all noticed the growling habits of
the beaists of prey, when they approach too
near each other at the time of feeding. Carnal
food, by being confined to one particular spot,
must always bring the consumers into contact.
On the contrary, fruitage is widely spread, and
offers abundant maintenance to the weak apart
from the strong. Even hounds, whose nature
is mollified by art, and which are brought by
discipline to hunt in concert, cannot be pre-
vented from fighting for their share of the
dying fox ; and were you to treat them in the

K 4

136 ON THE FOOD OF ANIMALS.

field to a dead horse, you would hear nothing
but the yells of the bitten, and the snarls of
others in possession of the food.

Thus, then, instinct points out to carnivorous
animals the necessity of procuring subsistence
by solitary effort. And this is well ordained,
for the carcass of a deer would ill requite the
united efforts of forty lions to secure it. Were
they to try the experiment once, their mutual
lacerations in the conflict for a morsel of it
would teach them to adopt some more agree-
able and more productive plan in future.

I consider the stories about wolves hunting
in packs as mere inventions for the nursery, to
keep cross children quiet. That these animals
may join on the road, and arrive at the same
point, is a casualty at best, and seldom to be
witnessed ; for their united voracious appetites
would soon have the effect of rendering federal
pursuit null and void, by the utter extermin-
ation of the object. A fructivorous flock,
however nmnerous at first, would eventually
fall a prey to a carnivorous one, as the last
would always be on the look out to appease its
hunger on the slaughter of the first ; and both
being inhabitants of the same district, they

ON THE FOOD OF ANIMALS. 137

could not fail to come in contact for obvious
reasons, and then the weaker would be con-
sumed ; after which, if the carnivorous animals
remained in company, mutual slaugliter would
be the consequence, or individual death through
starvation. When the wolf has business at the
sheepfold he goes alone. " Incustoditum captat
ovile lupus."

As food is evidently the staff of animal life,
and its chief enjoyment, we ought not even to
hazard a conjecture, that Providence would
doom carnivorous animals, as we do our poor,
to die for want of it ; and which most assuredly
would be their ultimate destiny, did they seek
support in congregated packs. But, were carnal
food as widely diffused, and as easy of access as
is the herbaceous, we might possibly observe
the phenomenon of carnivorous animals en-
joying a hearty meal together, without a single
growl or angry look.

Peaceable is the conduct of the bull, the
ram, the horse, and the goat, when grazing on
the flowery pasture. But widely different
woTild be the demeanour of a wolf, a fox, a
foumart, and a jackal, on the prostrate carcass
of a wild boar. Still, the former have as much

138 ON THE FOOD OF ANIMALS.

spirit, and as many fighting propensities at a
certain season of the year, as the latter. Scar-
city of food then, and its circumscribed position,
cause these to feed in strife, whilst its abun-
dance and extended distribution enable those
to graze in peace. In a word, harmony exists
where Nature " epulas sine coede et sanguine
prsebet," — and discord, where " sanguine san-
guis alatur."

Food has a surprising effect on the animal
system ; and in its quality, use, and quantity,
man — rational man, may take a salutary lesson
from the irrational favourites which flock around
his homestead. The Spaniards tell us, that
other people's cares destroy the ass, — " Qui-
dados agenos matan al asno." But, putting
aside harsh usage and too much work, how
comes it that an ass, contented with his thistle
in the hedge bottom of the highway, will live
for twenty or thirty years without an apparent
ailment ; whilst a man labours under one kind
of disease or other, more or less severe, during
a considerable portion of his life ? How is it,
that through the effect of man's improvements
in agriculture, the stag in his luxuriant park
contracts a disease in the liver ; whilst that on

ON THE FOOD OF ANIMALS. 139

the bleak mountain's top, is ever healthy and
knows nothing of it ? Our race-horses are al-
ways wanting the veterinary surgeon, and our
dairy cattle the cow-doctor. Our sheep get the
rot ; our lapdogs the mange ; and our poultry
tumble down in apoplexy. Were these animals
allowed to range at large through Nature's wild
domain, free from the control of man, we
should always see them brisk and vigorous, and
as full of health, and as beautiful in their na-
tural clothing for the season, as are their con-
geners roving independent of all his boasted
improvements.

What a melancholy thing it is to reflect that
rational man is perpetually indisposed, and sub-
ject to a multiplicity of disorders, wliich are
seldom or ever to be observed in the wild and
irrational animals! Flesh and blood, and all
their component parts, are the same both in
man and beast. Why then should man be
doomed to such heavy demands from the doctor
and apothecary, whilst the beast, in a state of
Nature, can do so well without their aid ?
Had Providence doomed the flesh and blood of
the inferior animals to the many maladies whicji
haunt our own, there would certainly have been

140 ON THE FOOD OF ANIMALS.

prepared some efficient remedies for their re-
storation to health in the day of need. But
this has not been the case ; wherefore, we may
conclude, that no such provision was necessary;
and upon the strength of this, we may surmise
with just reason, that we have brought our
sicknesses upon ourselves by our own follies; for,
as we are at the head of the creation, we cannot
suppose for a moment that Heaven would in-
troduce disease into its primest work, and allow
its secondary product to be without it.

When we see that the brute creation thrives
so admirably upon imiformity of food, and that
man is observed to languish under a multi-
plicity of it, we are enabled, without much
difficulty, to get at the source which gives rise
to his innumerablie infirmities. And this leads
us straight into his kitchen ; ay, his kitchen !
that sweet enchanting tempter, but, at the same
time, an inexorable foe to health, the best and
truest friend of man.

On the day that Oliver Cromwell (there now
wants two by all accounts) went to scour the
Parliament House, and met Sir Harry Vane in
the threshold, he cried out in horror, with up-
lifted hands, " The Lord deliver me from Sir

ON THE FOOD OF ANIMALS. 141

Harry Vane ! " And I may say, in like manner,
on viewing the kitchen, Oh, deliver me from
the thraldom of that mortal enemy of my con-
stitution ! It keeps gout under the dresser, and
fever in the cupboard. It smiles, and smirks,
and smells sweetly, and tempts me beyond my
strength; and then, having overcome my philo-
sophy, like Circe with the sailors of old, it turns
me into a swine. There is no escaping from
such an insidious destroyer. It puts its every
resource in requisition, in order to effect my
ruin. Say, ye stern moralists of the day, how
can I resist roast beef with horse-radish?
mutton with caper-sauce ? and lamb with vernal
salad ? And when I have unfortunately eaten
too much of these, up comes an omelet from
the kitchen, smoking hot, and then a cranberry
tart, with cheese and celery in the rear. After
which, there are fruits and preserves, with a
" nunc est bibendum."

" Jolly mortals, fill your glasses."

Ye powers of mastication ! what is to become
of me ? who can escape from such daily allure-
ments ? such beautiful manchineels ? All, all
are enticing me into the snare, and I am a slave
past redemption. Would there were some

142 ON THE FOOD OF ANIMALS.

prudent doctor from Barataria to put his wand
upon the treacherous dishes, and forbid me to
touch their contents ! But there are no such
true friends now-a-days. All are lavish in the
praise of the kitchen. I must give up to them
my better judgment.

" Video meliora, proboque j

Deteriora sequor."

I am a victim to savoury smells and tempting
cheer ; whilst some mellow mortal sings, —

" O the joys, the charms of dinner !
O the scent divinely sweet !
He's a base, unfeeling sinner

Who can shy this splendid treat."

A very slight inspection of our alimentary
system will give us too much reason to con-
jecture that the greater part of our bodily
achings and ailments have their origin in an
over-loaded stomach.

As I have not an opportunity of examining
the interior of a dinner-fitted stomach, I will
beg a seat in the hazel-nut chariot of Shak-
speare's Queen Mab, and take a drive through
the gastric regions of a performer at the annual
civic dinner, given by the first magistrate of
the metropolis ; and where " lords and dukes
and noble princes," and doctors in law, in

ON THE FOOD OF ANIMALS. 143

physic and divinity, strive their utmost to do
credit to the festive board. What a mass of
incongruous aliment is exposed to view ! hard
and soft, light and heavy, salt and sour, sweet
and spicy, green and greasy, all floating in a
pool of the choicest wines from France and
Spain. The operator seems to have tried his
grinders at game and fish, butcher's meat and
poultry, and fruits and confectionery, until his
jaw has refused to act.

What must be the state of a stomach so
sensible and so delicately formed by Nature,
under such an heterogeneous burden ? How
such a stomach would wish to be the property
of a goose or an ass, in li'eu of belonging to a
rational being ! and how the circumjacent vitals
must be incommoded by its unnatural intrusion
upon their own sphere of action. We now see
clearly the immediate cause of headache and
blue devils, and inflammation, with a long train
of ruinous disorders, which bring the noble
frame of man to dust long before its time. Well
may we hail the improvements in surgery and in
pharmacy, by which the machine is enabled to
keep in motion at a time when we do every
thing in our power to impede its motion.

144 ON THE FOOD OF ANIMALS.

In summary, then, we may rely upon it that
the inventive povt^ers of man, ever alive to his
own gratification, are always at work to prepare
an aliment for him, so tasty, so delicious, so
nice and so seductive withal, that his forti-
tude and better judgment cannot make a stand
against it, although he is aware that his frame
of body will not do its duty under it. He has
a daily lesson read to him by the free irrational
animals around him ; notwithstanding which,
he and his family will go on to the end of time
in its pernicious course, pretty well to-day, in-
disposed to-morrow, and a little better again
the day after, and so on, a victim to his tyrant
appetite, whilst his inferiors know not what
sickness is, and pass a life of vigour and of joy.
In fact, whole communities of men and women
must submit to their fate with due resignation ;
and they may comfort themselves with the
thought that by physic and physicians they can
struggle on to a fair old age, whilst the beast
of the field can arrive at the same, without the
aid of either.

At the time that gout is destroying the sym-
metry of our originally fine form, and rheu-
matism arresting our inherent activity, we may

ON THE FOOD OF ANIMALS. 145

turn to the ass in the lane, and say to him in
the sorrow of our hearts, " Poor beast, although
thy disproportioned ears may excite our con-
tempt, and thy braying our ridicule, neverthe-
less, when left to thine own resources, thou
hast that within thee which directs thee to thy
welfare. Thou hast a means from Providence,
' ut scias reprobare malum et eligere bonum : '
an advantage which we also possess from the
same divine source, but which, when the kitchen
is concerned, we have not fortitude to turn to
our profit. The attractions of the shambles,
the larder, and the oven, too often make us thy
inferiors."

Were it not for the wonderful accommodation
of Nature, we should have a very short time of
it here below. But, luckily, she is a good
friend to us ; for, although she thinks proper
to chastise us with incidental attacks of sickness
and disease, she kindly habituates our bodies to
surprising extremes of plenitude and poverty.
Thus we read that Claudius Albums could
dispatch at one supper 500 figs, 100 peaches,
10 melons, 20 lb. of grapes, 100 ortolans, and
60 oysters. No doubt the glutton's constitu-
tion paid handsomely for this. To have borne

L

146 ON FRESH AIR,

such a load, the fellow's stomach must have
been as strong as Mr. Bull's back, saddled with
800 millions of debt, and Peel's income-tax to
boot, by way of Mackintosh. I would not
have slept in the same sty with this hog for the
finest bird of Paradise from the woods of New
Guinea.

As an opposite extreme, I may notice Cornaro
of our own times. By never touching butcher's
meat, and by extraordinary abstinence, he saved
himself, at the age of thirty, from consumption,
pronounced mortal by his physician ; and he
lived to somewhere above one hundred and
five years, ever happy, well, and merry, and
was blessed with the full use of all his faculties
to the very last.

ON FRESH AIR.

" Lucidus ac mundus, sit rite habitabilis aer,
Infectus neque sit, nee olens foetore cloacas."

Schol. Sal.
Let your air be clear and pure,
And free of odours from the sewer.

This super-excellent advice is almost lost on
the present generation of this country, for our

ON FRESH AIR. 147

congregated numbers, and the arrangement of
our houses, seem to be diametrically opposed to
it. Man acts strangely. Although a current
of fresh air is the very life of his lungs, he
seems indefatigable in the exercise of his in-
ventive powers to deprive them of this heavenly
blessing. Thus, he carefully closes every cranny
of his bed-chamber against its entrance, and
he prefers that his lungs shoxild receive the
mixed effluvium from his cellar and larder, and
from a patent little modern Aquarius, in lieu
of it.

Wliy should man be so terrified at the ad-
mission of night air into any of his apartments ?
It is Nature's ever-flowing current, and never
carries the destroying angel with it.

See how soundly the delicate little wren and
tender robin sleep under its full and immediate
influence, and how fresh and vigorous and
joyous they rise amid the surrounding dew-
drops of the morning. Although exposed all
night long to the air of Heaven, their lungs are
never out of order, and this we know by the
daily repetition of their song.

Look at the newly-born hare, without any
jiest to go to. It lives and thrives, and be-

L 2

148 ON FRESH AIR.

comes strong and playful, under the linmitigated
inclemency of the falling dews of night. I have
here a fine male turkey, full eight years old,
and he has not passed a single night in shelter.
He roosts in a cherry-tree, and always is in
primest health the year throughout, Three
dunghill fowls, preferring this cherry-tree to
the warm perches in the hen-house, took up
their airy quarters with him early in October,
and have never gone to any other roosting
place. The cow and the horse sleep safely on
the cold damp ground, and the roebuck lies
down to rest in the heather on the dewy moun-
tain's top. I myself can sleep all night long,
bareheaded, under the full moon's watry beams,
without any fear of danger, and pass the day in
wet shoes without catching cold.

Coughs and colds are generally caught in the
transition from an over-heated room to a cold
apartment; but there would be no danger in
this movement if ventilation were properly at-
tended to, — a precaution little thought of
now-a-days. "We are subject to contract rheu-
matism by lying in damp places, and more es-
pecially on damp beds. Still many wild animals,
whose flesh and blood is of the same nature as

ON FRESH AIR. 119

our own, Are much more abroad during the
falling dews of night than under the warm sun
of day, — the fox, the badger, and polecat, to
wit ; but we never find these animals out of
sorts with achings or witli pains.

He who takes a pleasure in ruminating on
the varied habits of animated nature will soon
learn the cause why man can bear so little, and
the brute so much, whilst under exposure to
the open air. Custom is allowed to be second
nature. To custom, then, we apply for in-
formation on the present subject.

The ass goes without clothes, whilst man has
a garment over him ; but, were man deprived
of this, he would tremble in the breeze which
does not in the least affect his humble beast of
burden. The custom, then, of wearing clothes
has placed man in this inferiority ; for those
parts of his body free from covering, feel as
little inconvenience in a storm as the ass itself.
Thus the hands of the ploughman, by per-
petual exposure to the weather, become as
hardy as the hide of the horse which goes
on before him ; and the face of a stage-coach-
man (alas ! this fine breed is nearly extinct)
will bear the pelting of the north-east blast as

150 ON FRESH AIR.

well as the stoutest bullock on Scotland's
highest moors.

But, although civilisation has put it out of
the power of man in general to bear the in-
clemency of the weather with full impunity, it
ought not to follow on that account that he
should render himself still more unfit, by so
pertinaciously excluding the fresh air from his
apartments. It is a pity that we cannot man-
age matters in such a manner as to enjoy our-
selves Avithin doors, and at the same time run
no risk of catching cold when exposed to the
vicissitudes of the weather without. This
might easily be effected by a well regulated
ventilation.

Here, let me remark, that he who first pro-
posed the health-destroying window tax, ought
to have been sent to the pillory once a month,
during the remainder of his life : and that those
who gave it their sanction, ought to have been
condemned to work in the capacity of night-
soilers for fourteen years at least.

Ventilation, however, would not always suit
the nature of some of our factories ; and where
that is the case, the operatives must submit to
disease in its foulest shape without repining, as

ON FRESH AIR. 151

modern commerce is allowed to take precedence
of health. " Quaerenda pecunia primum est."
God help the poor soul whom abject poverty
forces into those colossal repositories of pesti-
lential vapours where the direful effect of con-
finement puts one so much in mind of Sterne's
"Captive:" "He saw him pale and feverish.
For thirty years the western blast not once had
fanned his blood."

Why should the farmer's boy be so rosy,
blithe, and joyous the live-long day, whilst the
poor fellow in the factory appears so broken
up and jaded ? they are both the sons of toil
and labour, but the work of the first is in reality
more fatiguing. The cause is obvious. A
tainted atmosphere scathes all the vigour of the
one, whilst the fresh air of heaven upholds the
other in all the full luxuriance of health.

If we turn to a sick room, we are apt to
surmise that the doctor in attendance never
once takes the state of the lungs under his
serious consideration, except in cases of ap-
parent consumption. Although he has learned
from anatomy that pure air is most essential to
them, still he allows his patient to be in a tomb
as it were, walled round with dense curtains,

lo'2 ON FRESH AIR.

where the wholesome breeze can gain no ad-
mittance, and where the foul vapours issue
from the feverish mouth, and retvurn to it, and
from thence to the lungs, which are barely able
tQ perform their duty. The windows are con-
stantly shut, and the door most carefully closed ;
by which mischievous custom the lungs have no
chance of receiving a fresh supply of air from
without, and at last the patient sinks in death
for want of it. If those in typhus fever were
conveyed to an open shed, screened on one side
against the blowing wind, with a sufficiency of
clothes upon them, very little physic would be
required, for the fresh air woiild soon subdue
the virulence of the disease in nine cases out
of ten.

When a person finds that he cannot sleep at
night, if he would open the window and take a
few turns up and down the room, there can be
no doubt but that sweet sleep, " placidissime
somne Deorum," would return with him arm-in-
arm to bed. Wonderful is the degree of heat
which is generated by the human body when
prostrate on a soft bed. Those parts of the sheets
which do not come in contact with it, will of
course retain their wonted coldness ; and then.

ON FRESH AIR. 153

if the person becomes restless in his sleep, and
rolls over upon tliem, he runs a fair risk of con-
tracting rheumatic pains scarcely ever to be
removed. Should a man have the terrible mis-
fortune to pass the night in a damp bed, he
would be much worse off than if he had been
condemned to lie on a pismire's nest. These
little tormentors would merely blister him,
perhaps even with salutary effect; but the
humid bed would cause him damage often
beyond the power of art or nature to repair.

Beds have vast attractions ; beds, to wit, of
down and roses. But we are not told who has
slumbered there the night before. In fact, we
never ask the question. Mine hostess assures
us that they have been well-aired, but she does
not mean that they have been aired by the
noonday's healthy sunbeams. She gives you to
understand, by saying that the bed has been
well-aired, that in fact it has constantly been
slept upon by a succession of travellers, of
whose health, or the want of it, not the slightest
mention is ever made. The last occupier may
have been one whose

" Form was fresher than the morning rose,
When the dew wets its leaves ; "

154 ON FRESH AIR.

" The softest blush that Nature spreads,
Gave colour to her cheek : "

or, on the contrary, the bed might have
been occupied by a rough-skinned, pimpled
victim to tiirtle soup and Cura§oa. He had
been nearly a month at Harrowgate without
benefit, and was on his way to the Continent,
with his medical adviser, to try what the spas
of Germany would do for him.

A person, on whose veracity I could depend,
and who seemed to have scrutinised the general
state of dormitories with a considerable degree
of attention, once told me that he had not
passed a single hour in bed for fourteen years.
He said he was his own master in that respect,
and cduld suit himself as he thought fit. He
added that his aversion to enter a strange bed
was extreme. He did not know who had been
there before him, or what impurities might be
lurking in the region of the feather bed, or
whether it had been au-ed by Phoebus or by
Bacchus ; and that the possibility of getting
into a damp bed acted upon his nerves more
terribly than did the operation of Sir Robert
Peel's income tax.

'"' And how do you manage," said I, " without

ON FRESH AIR. 155

a bed ? " " Uncommonly well," said lie.
*' My apprenticeship," continued he, " to the
hard floor only cost me a fortnight, and after
that all went right."

He then informed me that the advantages
which he had acquired by abandoning the bed
for ever, were incalculable. He said that so
long as there was a current of fresh air in the
place where he laid him down to rest, he was
excellently accommodated for a fair spell of
sleep. Travelling had no longer any nocturnal
terrors for him. Whilst others were anxious
about the paraphernalia of their bed-rooms,
and peevish when things were not to their
liking, he stood smiling on, pitying their dis-
tresses, and happy with the thought that he
could stow himself away for the night in a
moment, free from bad bugs, bad breaths, and
bad bedding. " And will you never more sleep
in a bed ? " said I. " Never," said he, with a
smile of contentment on his face. " Nature
has accommodated herself to me, and I to
Nature. What more can I wish ? " He
ceased on saying this. I entered fully into his
feelings, and ere I retired to rest I thought if
we had more of fortitude and less of self-love,

156 ON FRESH AIR.

things would go better with us, both night and
day, than they do at present.

From the remarks which I have hastily put
together in this paper, I trust we may safely
conclude, that when the soft and downy pre-
parations for the repose of the night have been
completed, we do wrong, very wrong indeed,
to exclude the night air from our apartments.
That we can absolutely do without it is certain ;
but that we should do better with it, is equally
certain ; and we draw this conclusion from an
inspection of all animated nature, for we see
the beasts of the earth, and the fowls of heaven,
passing the whole of their life unprotected by
artificial means, and thriving well, either in
the noonday sun, or under the nocturnal dews,
or exposed to the foiir rude winds of the sky,
even when winter has set in.

Still civilised man will never change his usual
habits, but will go snoring on from night to
night, awake this hour, and dozing that, whilst
his lungs, if they had the power of speech,
would cry out and say : " Oh ! we cannot stand
this nasty atmosphere ; we are obliged to work
all night, and still you seem to have no pity
for us. What with the unwholesome vapours,

BEAUTY IN THE ANIMAL CREATION. 157

arising from your own overloaded stomach, and
what with the stagnant air in the room, we shall
be overpowered at last, do what we can to keep
our action up ; and then, for want of having
your window an inch or two open (which would
put every thing to rights in our department),
when you least expect it, you will be called
away to your long account by a fatal fit of
apoplexy.

ON BEAUTY IN THE ANIMAL CREATION.

Every species in the great family of animated
nature is perfect in its own way, and most ad-
mirably adapted to the sphere of life in which
an all-ruling Providence has ordered it to move.
Could we divest ourselves of the fear which we
have of the serpent, and forget for a while the
dislike which we invariably show to the toad,
both these animals would appear beautiful in
our eyes ; for, to say nothing of the brilliant
colours which adorn the snake, there is won-
derful grace and elegance in the gliding pro-
gress, wherein this reptile's symmetry appears
to such great advantage.

158 ON BEAUTY IN

The supposed horribly fascinating power,
said to be possessed by the serpent, through
the medium of the eye, has no foundation in
truth. We give the snake credit for fixing his
eye upon us, when in fact he can do no such
thing ; for his eye only moves with his body,
and it has always the same appearance, and
remains in the same position, whether the ani-
mal be roused by rage, or depressed by fear.
It is shielded by an outward scale, which has
no communication with it, and against which it
cannot press : so that when we behold the eye
of me serpent, represented by artists as start-
ing out of the socket, we know that their
delusive imagination has been at work, and
that they are lamentably ignorant of the ana-
tomy of this anim.al. If Mr. Swainson be an
admirer of correctness in design, I would re-
commend him to revise and correct his over-
strained eulogy on a certain overstrained per-
formance which he terms, " mocking birds
defending their nest from a rattle-snake." —
(See Biography of Birds.)

The toad, that poor, despised, and harmless
reptile, is admirable in its proportions, and has
an eye of such transcendant beauty, that when

THE ANIMAL CREATION. 159

I find one, I place it on my band, to view it
more minutely. Its skin, too, so completely
adapted to the subterraneous places into wbich
it goes for shelter, is well worthy the attention
of the philosopher. As this little animal is
innocuous, I feel sorry when I see it trampled
underfoot by inconsiderate people, who have
learned from their grandmothers that it is full
of venom ; and I wish from my heart, that the
nineteenth century would produce something
more satisfactory than that which we possess
at present, relative to the true habits of toads
and snakes. We have a large species of wasp
in Demerara, called Maribunta, much more
severe with its sting than our English wasp ;
still, when I used to put down one of these to
a toad which I had in a little out-house, the
toad would come and swallow it alive, both
with avidity and impunity.

Who can look without rapture on the beau-
tiful proportions of the horse ? His mane
hanging down a well-formed neck, seems a
counterbalance to his long flowing tail as he
moves along; and we are all of us aware of
what amazing advantage this last-mentioned
appendage is to this noble beast, when a host

160 ON BEAUTY IN

of flies are ready to devour him. In fact,
there is no putting a sufficient value on this
ornamental part ; for, whilst he is left in the
full possession of it, he can effectually scourge
his tormentors, which never fail to attack those
places extending beyond the reach of his mouth
and hoofs. But man, wanton and unthinking
man, the slave to fashion and caprice, has
cruelly deprived his best and most useful friend
amongst the quadrupeds, of this great advan-
tage which Nature had so kindly given him ;
and now we see him, in summer, stung and
tormented at every step by blood-thirsty in-
sects, from which he .cannot free himself by any
process short of rolling on the ground.

What, in the name of form and feature,
could ever have persuaded Englishmen, that
the fine flowing mane of their horses was a
nuisance which ought to be reduced ; or that
the appearance of these superb animals could
be improved, by docking their tails to a stump
some eleven inches long ? Nay, I can well
remember the time, when this destructive
mania for improving the anatomy of the horse
by subtraction, had arisen to such a height of
absurdity, that both cart and carriage horses

THE ANIMAL CREATION. 161

were so entirely bereft of tail, as to present an
exhibition disgusting in the extreme. Simple
farmers and waggoners had been choused out
of their common sense, and taught to believe
that such a privation added strength to the
general system ; just as some unknowing ones
of the present day fancy that the pruning
knife produces additional growth in those
branches which it spares. This docking pes-
tilence (I allude to the custom of removing the
whole of the tail) once raged throughout our
island ; and you would have thought that Dame
Nature herself had taken smittle, as we say in
Yorkshire ; for I knew a farmer's mare in the
county of Durham, about the year 1794, that
produced three foals successively without any
tail at all.

I once thought that I could befriend the
valuable animal on which I am writing, by
allowing him the full quantity of tail which
nature had given to him ; and having, at that
time, two fine steeds only recently broken in,
I gave orders that they should not be deprived
of their tails. But I gained nothing in the
end. People stared at me as I rode quietly
along. One said, if he possessed that capital

M

162 ON BEAUTY IN

horse, he would soon mend his looks by having
his ugly long tail oif. Others remarked, that
the horse must he from foreign parts: they
could tell it by its tail, for the outlandish people
there were but poor hands at setting a horse
off to advantage. A third would cry out,
with a grin, " There goes Long-tail ! " I bore
all this with becoming fortitude, till at last,
being obliged to ride to Leeds for mass on
Sundays, either the servants of the inn, or the
hangers-on in the stable-yard, made free with
my horse's tail, in order to turn a penny by the
hair ; and they shortened it so much, that it
neither appeared one thing nor another, and
at last I was reduced to the necessity of calling
in the aid of the docker to free myself from
future annoyance. This happened three and
twenty years ago.

Rational people now-a-days will scarcely
believe that near the close of the last century
Englishmen considered that the appearance of
the horse would be considerably improved by
depriving the poor beast of one half of his ears.
Yet this was the case ; and it was a common
thing to see horses whose mid-parts were
beautiful to behold, v^^hilst ( ach extremity pre-

THE ANIMAL CREATION. 163

sented a distressing picture of mutilation and
deformity. It would be difficult to discover
what could possibly have given rise to these
needless acts of cruelty ; for it is generally
supposed that the outward part of the ear
assists the entrance of sound into the cavity of
it : thus we observe blind horses in particular
with their ears perpetually pricked ; and as
the power of moving the ears at pleasure has
not been given to ourselves, we are often seen
to place our hand behind them, by way of
introducing the coming sound to more advantage.
There is still another operation on the
horse's tail, a torment of three weeks' duration
at the least. To be in high beauty, he must
have the remains of it (after docking has been
performed) curved up permanently over his
back. This superlative act of cruelty and bad
taste drew down upon us a pleasant and sar-
castic remark from the mouths of our Gallic
neighbours : — " Quelle folie des Anglais ! faire
couper les oreilles aux chevaux, et tourner la
queue en Pair."

What folly in these Englishmen appears f
They cock their horses' tails, and clip their ears.

The stinking polecat, shunned by most

M 2

164 ON BEAUTY IN

people and persecuted by every body, presents
to our view a symmetry of no ordinary beauty.
The length of his body is wonderfully well
adapted to that of his neck; and when he
carries his prey, there is such a stateliness in
his whole contour, that it is impossible not to
be struck with the elegance of his motions.

The sloth again is astonishing in its anatomy,
which is so peculiarly adapted to its habits that
we cannot help pronouncing it a production
perfect in every point of view. The strange
stories which we have had of it, have been
penned in the closet, not in the forest. I saw
in the " Nation," an Irish newspaper, of last
week, that we may shortly expect a living sloth
in London. I am rejoiced at this, because the
public will then find by actual observation that
I had sure ground to go upon when I ventured
to take a new view of this animal, whose eco-
nomy, up to that time, had been marvellously
misrepresented. But we live to learn, as the
old woman said when her cat was too lazy to
kill a mouse. The cat, by the way, is terribly
elegant in its frolics over the captured mouse ;
and it exhibits such suppleness of body, and
such elasticity in its springs, as can only be

~ THE ANIMAL CREATION. 1G5

equalled by those of the tiger itself. It were
loss of time to adduce any more specimens of
beauty and perfection in the animal world,
every part of which teems with objects calcu-
lated to increase our thanks and gratitude to
God. AVlien we talk of tliis ugly animal, or
of that deformed reptile, or of such a pernicious
insect, the true solution of these remarks is,
that we avoid the bear because he would hug
us to death ; that we dread the cayman because
he would swallow us ; and that we abhor the
bug on account of its bite and unsavoury
smell. Still, whilst we are examining these
animals as they lie dead before us, we may re-
mark, with the monster Nero, treading over
his own prostrate mother, we did not think
that they had been so handsome. In our
rambles up and down this globe, when we fall
in with animals whose shape appears to us
either defective or deformed, and whose habits
cannot be accounted for, we may lay it down
to a certainty, that the work of our great
Creator is perfect in all its parts ; and that we
are at a loss how to turn it to our profit, solely
because we have not spent a sufficient time at
school, in the instructive field of Nature.

M 3

166 BEAUTY IN THE ANIMAL CREATION.

I intended to have added here a few remarks
on man, and to have glanced at the noble sym-
metry of his frame, and to have made an ob-
servation or two on the habits which he has
acquired by being in a state of high civilisation :
but as he is the prince of the Creation, and
endowed with reason to make a selection of
what is pleasing and profitable to him from
Nature's giant storehouse, I will reserve a
chapter for the purpose. Volumes have been
written, and will still be written, on his virtues
and his vices, his merits and defects, his cus-
toms and his follies. With this before my
eyes, I scarcely know what to pen down on a
small scrap of paper, that may be in the least
worthy of the reader's attention. If I fail in
my attempt either to amuse him or to instruct
him, I trust that he will show me mercy, for I
feel quite convinced that the subject is far too
abstruse, refined, and lofty for an humble pen
like mine.

PROJECTED BANISHMENT OF ROOKS. 161

ON THE PROJECTED BANISHMENT OF THE
ROOKS FROM SCOTLAND.

" Bella manu, lethumque gerat furialis Erinnys."

The devil of discord, with an imp or two of his
own family, seems to have been let loose upon
this once unanimous nation. We have Peel
and Repeal, Corn and Cobden, Buxton and
Blackey, Kirk and Calvin, Pusey and Pro-
testantism, all armed with pike and javelin;
whilst poor old Mr. Bull, out at the elbows,
and with scarcely a shoe to his foot, has got
souse into debt, to the tune of eight hundred
millions, and sees at last, with horror, that he
is only just one single step from his palace to
the poorhouse. In this boisterous and jarring
state of things, Scotland, by way of pastime,
has just commenced hostilities against that
gregarious tribe of birds commonly known by
the name of rooks.

In the nineteenth century, fruitful epoch of
discovery, the Scottish farmers have found out
that the rooks, so much prized by their ances-
tors, are a set of pilfering and plundering

168 PROJECTED BANISHMENT OF

thieves, and that they ought to be treated in
no other light than that of rogues and vaga-
bonds ; wherefore they have now solemnly
denounced their former black friends, and they
have advised the country gentlemen, as they
value their crops, to show no mercy to the
rooks, but to kill them whenever an oppor-
tunity shall offer. J. M. Hog, Esq., of New-
liston, Kirkliston, North Britain, cannot find
in his heart to sacrifice his favourites ; and he
has written to me, to know what is my opinion
of the rook, and he has requested from me a
line or two upon the merits or demerits of
these birds. He himself entertains a very good
opinion of them, and he would not wish to
lose their valuable services, by joining in the
novel crusade against them ; a crusade, at the
best, of a somewhat doubtful nature, as to the
good or the evil to be derived from it.

On the 17th of March, 1844, I returned the
answer below to this gentleman's polite com-
munication. I place a copy of it in the second
volume of Essays, in order that our own farmers
may be put upon their guard in time, and thus
escape the infection which is now raging in
Scotland, and carrying off thousands of the

THE ROOKS FROM SCOTLAND. 169

most useful birds that ever settled on the old
oaks of that fair land, where, just nine-and-
ninety years ago, poor Charley Stuart drew
his ill-fated sword for the last time out of
its patriot scabbard, to fight for the legiti-
mate right of kings to the thrones of their
ancestors.

« To J. M. HOG, Esq.

"Walton Hall, March 19. 1844.

" Sir,

" Your communication to Mr. Dickson
is so much to the purpose, and contains such
sound arguments, that I consider a report from
myself would be nearly superfluous. However,
at your desire, I will enter briefly into the
subject, for I hold the rooks in great request.

" We have innumerable quantities of these
birds in this part of Yorkshire, and we consider
them our friends. They appear in thousands
upon our grass lands, and destroy myriads of
insects. After they have done their work in
these enclosures, you may pick up baskets full
of grass plants all injured at the root by the
gnawing insect. We prize the bii'ds much for

170 PROJECTED BANISHMENT OF

this, and we pronounce them most useful
guardians of our meadows and our pastures.

" Whenever we see the rooks in our turnip
fields, we know then, to our sorrow, what is
going on there ; we are aware that grubs are
destroying the turnips, and we hail with plea-
sure the arrival of the rooks, which alone can
arrest their dreaded progress. I have never
seen the least particle of turnip, or of turnip-
top, in the craws of the rooks, either young or
old. If these birds feed on Swedish turnips in
Scotland, they abstain from such food here, so
far as I can learn by enquiry: perhaps they
may be taking insects at the time that they are
seen perforating the turnip : dissection would
soon set this doubt at rest for ever. No farmer
in our neighbourhood ever complains that his
Swedish turnips are injured by the rook.

" The services of the rook to our oak trees are
positively beyond estimation. I do believe, if
it were not for this bird, all the young leaves
in our oaks would be consumed by the cock-
chafers.

"Whilst the ringdove is devouring the heart
shoot of the rising clover, you may see the rook
devouring insects in the same field.

THE ROOKS FROM SCOTLAND, 171

" The flesh of the rook is excellent : I con-
sider it as good as that of pigeon. People in
this part of the country will go any distance for
a dozen of young rooks, even at the risk of a
penalty for trespass.

"In 1814, eight tailors and a tailor's boy left
Wakefield on a Saturday night to enjoy a
fiddling party at a village called Himsworth,
some six miles from hence. In returning home
they were seized with a vehement desire of
looking into my rookery. The keeper surprised
them in the act of helping themselves, and as
he knew the major part of them personally,
they consented to appear before me. The
fellow had a touch of wag in him, and he in-
troduced them thus : — ' If you please, Sir,' said
he, ' I have catched eight tailors and a half
stealing young rooks.' — ' Well,' said I, ' after
all this noise on Sunday morning you have not
managed to bring me a full man, for we all
know in Yorkshire that it requires nine tailors
to make a man. Send them about their
business ; I can't think of prosecuting eight
ninths and a half of a man.'

" The faults of the rook in our imperfect eyes
are as follows. It pulls up the young blade of

ItZ PROJECTED BANISHMENT OF

corn on its first appearance, in order to get at
the seed-grain still at the root of it. The petty-
pilfering lasts about three weeks, and during
this period we hire a boy at three-pence a day,
sometimes sixpence, to scare the birds away.
Some years we have no boy at all. Either
way the crops are apparently the same in quan-
tity every year. In winter the rook will attack
the corn-stacks which have lost part of their
thatch by a gale of wind. He is a slovenly
farmer who does not repair the damaged roof
immediately ; and still we have farmers in
Yorkshire of this description. The rook cer-
tainly is too fond of our walnuts, and it requires
to be sharply looked after when the fruit is
ripe. In breeding time it vnll twist ofi* the
uppermost twigs of the English and Dutch
elms, and sometimes those of the oak in which
its nest is built, for the purpose of increasing it.
This practice gives the tops of the trees an un-
sightly appearance, and may injure their growth
in the course of time. Sycamores, beeches,
firs, and ashes, escape in great measure the
spoliation.

" It ought to be generally known that, in
former times the North American colonists

THE ROOKS FROM SCOTLAND. I/O

having banished the grakles (their rooks), the
insects ate up the whole of their grass ; and the
people were obliged to get their stock of hay
from Pennsylvania and from England : and
in the island of Bourbon, the poor Eastern
grakles disappeared under a similar persecution.
The islanders suffered in their turn, for clouds
of grasshoppers consumed every green blade ;
and the colonists were compelled to apply to
Government for a fresh breed of grakles, and
also for a law to protect them.

" Thus, it appears from history that the sages
of the East, and the wise men of the West,
did wrong in destroying their grakles. They
were severely punished for their temerity, by
the loss of their crops. They repented, and
repaired the damage ; and, so far as I can
learn, things have gone on well betwixt them-
selves and the grakles, and betwixt the grakles
and their crops, ever since. In 1824, I saw
immense flocks of these birds in the low mea-
dows of the Delaware.

" History, by the way, in our own species,
presents a parallel to the war of extermination
now raging against the rooks in Scotland.
When Voltaire and his impious sophisters had

174 PROJECTED BANISHMENT OF ROOKS.

determined on the total destruction of Chris-
tianity, he remarked, that he must begin with
the Jesuits. Chiefly by his own intrigues, and
those of the kept mistresses in the different
courts of Europe, the suppression of this cele-
brated order was effected. Very soon after
this had taken place, the civilised Indians of
America fell off rapidly from their improved
state, and ultimately returned to their original
wild habits, whilst vice and ignorance took the
lead in the European settlements, and have re-
tained it to this day. Frederick, the far-famed
King of Prussia, foresaw the future evils of
this suppression in their true colours, and he
made the following remark in a letter to Vol-
taire : — 'I have no reason to complain of Gan-
ganelli ; he has left me my dear Jesuits, who
are the objects of universal persecution. I
will preserve a seed of so precious and uncom-
mon a plant, to furnish those who may wish to
cultivate it hereafter.' In our days, we have
lately seen the people of South America apply-
ing to Rome for missionaries from the Society
of Jesus.

" I defend my sable friends the rooks here iii
England on account of their services to the

TIGHT SHOES, STAYS, AND CRAVATS. 175

land. Should the adverse party effect their
extirpation in Scotland, and then suffer by the
ravages of the grub, I will, at any time, be
happy to send you a fresh supply of these use-
ful and interesting birds.

" I remain. Sir,
" Your most obedient
" And humble servant,

•' Charles Waterton "

ON TIGHT SHOES, TIGHT STAYS, AND
CRAVATS.

The form of man is allowed by all writers,
ancient and modern, to stand foremost in the
ranks of animated nature. Man has it in his
power to retain his fine symmetry with greater
ease than any animal, because Omnipotence
has endowed him with reason ; whereas it has
only given instinct to those below him. Per-
haps there is nothing more attractive in the
Kving beauties of creation than the human
figure, standing firmly on the right foot, with

176 ON TIGHT SHOES,

the right arm elevated above the head in a
curve to the heavens, and the inside of the
half-closed hand towards the face ; v^^hilst the
other out-stretched foot barely touches the earth
with its extremity, forming as it were a grace-
ful counterpoise below, to the elegant attitude
above ; and the remaining arm hanging loosely
down, and at a little distance from the perpen-
dicular line which is formed by the erect posi-
tion of the body. With such a perfect form,
replete with reason, health, and vigour, man
acts strangely to his own disadvantage when-
ever he allows the foolish fashion of the day to
injure his symmetry, or permits the gratifica-
tion of his appetite to interfere with the ar-
rangements for the preservation of his health.

It is but too true that the astonishing dis-
coveries in the mode of preparing his food
have disposed him to disease in many frightful
shapes ; whilst the unfitness of his attire to the
true form of his body has been productive of
so much mischief to his general symmetry, that
there are doubts if he would not have been
better off had he adhered to his original haunts,
so admirably touched upon by Dryden : —

" When wild in woods the noble savage ran."

TIGHT STAYS, AND CRAVATS. 177

Civilised man has certainly an undoubted
right to put on clothes of any colour, or of and
size and shape ; but then, the rest of the con-
munity ought not to be pointed at, nor turned
into ridicule, if their own notions of raiment
dissuade them from imitating his example.
But how little is this liberality either practised
or understood by man reclaimed from the
forests ! Some royal spendthrift, supported by
the public purse, some brainless son of for-
tune just entered into the possession of enor-
mous wealth, sets the fashion ; and then all
must adopt it, be their aversion to it ever so
extreme. Fashion may be tolerable in some
degree when it merely trims the purse, but
it is utterly intolerable when it affects the
person.

He was a cunning and a clever shoemaker
who first succeeded in turning old Grandfather
Squaretoes into ridicule, and in setting up
young Sharpfoot as a pattern for universal
imitation. What must have been poor old
Dame Nature's surprise and vexation when
she saw and felt the abominable change? The
toes have their duty to perform, when the
frame of man is either placed erect, or put in

N

178 ON TIGHT SHOES,

motion : shoes at best are a vast incumbrance
to them ; but when it happens that shoes are
what is called a bad fit, then all goes wrong
indeed, and corns and blisters soon oblige the
wearer of them to wend his way

" With faltering step and slow."

When I see a man thus hobbling on, I con-
demn both his fortitude and folly : his forti-
tude, in undergoing a pedal martyrdom without
necessity; and his folly, in wearing, for fashion's
sake, a pair of shoes so ill adapted to his feet
in size and shape. Corns are the undoubted
offspring of tight shoes ; and tight shoes the
proper punishers of human vanity. If the
rules of society require that I should imprison
my toes, it does not follow that I should volun-
tarily force them on to the treadmill. The
foot of man does not end in a point ; its ter-
mination is nearly circular. Hence it is plain
and obvious that a pointed shoe will have the
effect of forcing the toes into so small a space
that one will lie over the other for want of
room. By having always worn shoes suited to
the form of my foot, I have now at sixty-two
the full use of my toes ; and this is invaluable
to me in ascendinar trees.

TIGHT STAYS, AND CRAVATS. 179

There is something very forbidding to my
eye in a foot with a pointed shoe on ; I always
fancy that I can see there, comfort, and ease,
and symmetry, all sacrificed at the tinsel shrine
of fashion. Never be it forgotten, that tight
shoes and tight garters are very successful
agents in producing cold feet; and that cold
feet are no friends to a warm heart. The foot
of man is formed in Nature's finest mould:
custom causes us to conceal it, and necessity to
defend it from the asperities of the flinty path ;
but we never can improve its original shape, or
add any thing to its natural means, in the per-
formance of its important task.

It were well if our bodily miseries com-
menced and ended in our shoes ; but there is
something fearfully wrong in our wearing ap-
parel at the other end of our body betwixt the
head and shoulders.

What in the name of hemp and bleaching
has a cravat to do with the throat of man, ex-
cept at Tyburn? The throat is the great
thoroughfare or highway for the departure and
return of the blood from the heart to the head,
and back again ; and we all know that pressure
on the vessels which contain this precious fluid

180 ON TIGHT SHOES,

may be attended with distressing, and even
fatal, consequences ; so that, when a man falls
down in a fit, the first attempt at relief on the
part of the bystanders is to untie his cravat.
Indeed, the windpipe, the veins, and the ar-
teries located in the neck, may be considered
as life's body-guards, which will not allow them-
selves to be too severely pressed upon with
impunity.

When we consider how very near these main
channels of life are to the surface of the throat,
we wonder at the temerity of the man who first
introduced the use of cravats as a protection
against the weather, or as an ornament to
the parts. When he was about this roguish
business, why did he stop short at the neck ?
He might just as well have offered clothing to
the nose and cheeks. If these last-mentioned
parts of our mortal frame can safely accom-
modate themselves to the blasts of winter or
the summer's sun, surely the throat might be
allowed to try its fortune in the external air,
especially when we see this important privilege
conceded to females in every rank of life, and
of the most delicate constitutions.

If any part of the human body be allowed

TIGHT STAYS, AND CRAVATS. 181

to be uncovered in these days of observation
and improvement, certainly the throat of man
has the best claim to exemption from the
punishment which it undergoes at present.

However, we are not quite so outrageous
now-a-days in some things as we were when I
was a lad. I remember well the time when
cravats of enormous height and thickness were
all the go. 'Twas said that these jugular bol-
sters came into fashion on account of some un-
sightly rosebuds having made their appearance
a little below the ears of a royal dandy. This
may have been scandal for aught I know to the
contrary ; but certain it is, that the new inven-
tion spread like wildfire, and warmed the
throats of all in high life. A connexion of
ours placed so much stress upon the necessity
of it, that he never considered himself suf-
ficiently well dressed until he had circumvented
his neck with seven cravats, — only two less
in number than the aqueous folds which sur-
rounded the body of Eurydice, when she was in
the realms below, where

« Novies Styx interfusa coercet :

" Fate had fast bound her
With Styx nine times round her."

182 ON TIGHT SHOES,

My own cravat, although it had nothing ex-
traordinary either in size or shape, had once
very nearly been the death of me. One night,
on going my rounds alone in an adjacent wood,
I came up with two poachers : fortunately one
of them fled, and I saw no more of him. I
engaged the other ; wrenched the knife out
of his hand, after I had parried his blow, and
then closed with him. We soon came to the
ground together, he uppermost. In the struggle,
he contrived to get his hand into my cravat,
and twisted it till I was within an ace of being
strangled. Just as all was apparently over with
me, I made one last convulsive effort, and I
sent my knees, as he lay upon me, full against
his stomach, and threw him off. Away he
went, carrying with him my hat, and leaving
me his own, together with his knife and twenty
wire snares.

I cannot possibly understand why we strong
and healthy men should be doomed by fashion
to bind up our necks like sheaves of corn, and
thus keep our jugular veins in everlasting jeo-
pardy. I know one philosopher in Sheffield who
sets this execrable fashion nobly at defiance,
and always appears without a cravat. How I

TIGHT STAYS, AND CRAVATS. 183

revere him for this ; and how I condemn myself
for not having sufficient fortitude to follow his
example ! The armadillo and land tortoise of
Guiana, although encased in a nearly impene-
trable armour, have their necks free. Indeed,
man alone is the only being to be found in the
whole range of animated nature who goes with
a ligature on the throat.

Thus it would appear that fashion brings
torment to our toes, and peril to our throats.
But what a still more unfavourable opinion
must we entertain of this inexorable goddess
when we reflect that, by her invention of tight
stays, she dooms thousands of young females to
lose their health and symmetry, and to sink at
last into the cold and dreary grave long before
their time.

The crocodile, although sheathed in adamant
both above and below, has his sides free for
the expansion of his body ; and this most
necessary provision has been kindly given to
him by old Dame Nature, for the well working
of his iron frame. Shall, then, our own thought-
less dames of fashion, with this example before
their eyes, allow their still more thoughtless
daughters to counteract the plan of Nature by

184 ON TIGHT SHOES,

putting those parts into prison which, as they
value their health, ought always to remain free ?

No sooner are the external parts sent in
by the ligature of stays, than the internal
parts begin to suffer from the unnatural pres-
sure ; and then the heart, and lungs, and ad-
jacent vitals, robbed of their means of full ex-
pansion by this ugly, bad, and cruel process, no
longer can perform their duty as they once
were wont to do. In the mean time, health
sees closing in upon her a train of diseases, wan,
and hideous, and terrible to think of. Irregular
beatings of the heart, loss of appetite, loss of
health, and loss of sleep, are the certain con-
sequences, in a greater or a less degree, of cir-
cumventing the body with a pair of tight stays.

Nature must and will be free. If you press
her on one part, she will protrude at another ;
and there she will cause a permanent deformity,
if you continue to torment her.

In Prussia and in Italy, nothing can exceed
the horrible distortions brought upon the human
frame by the use of swaddling clothes. In these
countries may be seen the spine in every stage
of deformity that the most vivid imagination
can conceive, with a misshapen breast as a

TIGHT STAYS, AND CRAVATS. 185

counterpart to it. When the moralist shall
have made his tour through these regions,
where a most lamentable deficiency of common
sense in the proper application of wearing
apparel has exposed the frame of civilised man
to all the horrors of spinal curvature and
decrepitude, let him repair to the forests of
Guiana, in which Nature has had her own
way in training the human frame. During the
whole of the time I spent in those interminable
wilds, I never observed a female, either young
or old, who was labouring under a complaint of
the spine. These obedient children of good
Dame Nature have never had their better
judgment warped by the sophistry of the advo-
cates of fashion, nor their vanity punished by
deformity. Not a single pair of stays, nor any
thing resembling them, did I see during my
wanderings in that uncivilised part of the globe.
Oh, it makes an honest man's heart ache to
see his fellow-creatures cheated out of their
birthright by the intrigues of fashion. Can
there be a sight in all nature more sad and
melancholy than to behold the beauteous female
form sinking gradually into the tomb through
the indiscreet application of ligature to those

186 TIGHT SHOES, STAYS, AND CRAVATS.

parts which Providence had formed so true in
their proportions, and of such charming sym-
metry? That fine black eye, expressive of a
noble soul within, has lost its wonted bright-
ness ; those feet no longer move with firmness ;
the frame can barely keep from drooping. In
a few weeks more, a close confinement to the
bedroom will shut out the last sweet carol of
the nightingale and lark.

" That face, alas ! no more is fair ;
Those lips have lost their red ;
Those cheeks no longer roses bear,
And every charm is fled."

THE DOMESTIC SWAN. 187

NOTE.

[The following observations were received from Mr.
Wateeton after tlie essay on the Domestic Swan
(p. 120—130.) had been printed off.]

I AM not much versed in the anatomy of the human
gullet ; but, if it can bear an operation of the dissecting
knife with as much success as that of our domestic swan,
there would not be any danger of a fatal result, by the
stoppage of a fish-bone in its passage downwards.

Towards the close of last April, our favourite male
swan swallowed a double eel-hook, to which was at-
tached a shank of twisted wire about a foot in length.
It had descended so low into the gidlet, and fixed itself
so firmly there, that I saw at once we had no chance
whatever of extracting it by the moiith.

Knowing that death must inevitably ensue If the hook
were not removed in due time, and distrusting my own
operating powers on a living bird, I sent over to Wake-
field, and requested the immediate attendance of Mr,
Bennett, our scientific family- surgeon. He laid open the
gullet to the extent of six inches, and we drew out the
hook from this frightful apertiu'e. The wound Avas then
closed by suture, and, without any other application, the
bird was turned loose upon its native element ; as we
judged it would do better there, than if put Into con-
finement.

188 THE DOMESTIC SWAN.

The swan, on regaining its liberty, went to the upper
part of the lake, far out of sight ; and we saw nothing
more of it till the following clay at noon, when it returned
to the house, and ate the bread which was offered to it.
After this, it was in sight every day, and nobody could
perceive that it suffered on account of the operation.

The place where its feathers had been cvit away, in
order to facilitate the working of the dissecting knife, is
now replenished with new ones, and the swan appears in
as prime health as it was. before the Instrument had been
applied to its gullet.

mihoH Hall, Sept. 23.

APPEl^DIX.

APPENDIX.

AN ORNITHOLOGICAL LETTER TO WILLIAM
SWAINSON, ESQ. F.R.S.

Sib,
I HAVE a crow to pluck with you. As we are both
bird-men, the operation will cost us but little time and
trouble.

A recent letter from Philadelphia refers me to your
History and Classification of Birds. "By the by,"
says the writer of the letter, " this knight of the sublime
theory of circles (alluding to you) speaks rather dispa-
ragingly of the Yorkshire squire, whom he terms an
Amateur^

I have borrowed your book, and on looking into it I
find that you have introduced the names of a vast num-
ber of those who have written on birds. Of all these
you have made friendly — of mine alone unfriendly —
mention.

I am, beyond doubt, the person alluded to in your
complaint of unjustifiable personalities against Mr. Au-
dubon ; and I am the Amateur who went to Demerara
merely to procure perfect skins ; neglecting " all which
could be truly beneficial to science." My invaluable
prescription for the preservation of objects in Natural
History has received a solemn anathema from your
mouth. You tell the world that I seem to think it a
" modern discovery, ; " but lest there should be any merit

190 APPENDIX.

due to it, you take care to introduce Sii' James Smith,
who, you say, strongly recommends it as a preservative
against insects.

By the way, I have never in all my life read one single
line from the pen of Sir James Smith.

Be all this as it may, the upshot is, that my unfor-
tunate name is now stuck up by you, in the Cyclopadia
of the celebrated Doctor Lardner, without one solitary
epithet which might entitle it to a nod of approbation
from your far-famed employer. — Better not have intro-
duced it at all.

When a man who is not sufficiently well armed espies
a lynx slumbering in the woods, he immediately takes
himself off, as quickly and as quietly as possible, lest by
approaching too near he may disturb the animal, and
thus be treated to an awful exhibition of his teeth and
claws.

Though from the place of my repose I have more
than once seen you bewildered and lost in the quinary
labyrinth of your fond conceit of Circles, and have had
you completely in my power, still I have never thought
of springing at you ; because you did not appear to
show symptoms of an attempt to break in upon my
retreat.

But now, that you have not only aroused me from my
slumber, — but have even been incautious enough to
take me by the beard ; — neither yourself nor your friends
ought to be sui'prised if I lay a vengeful and a heavy
paw upon you.

Pray, how can you venture to pronounce my person-
alities against JNIr. Audubon unjustifiable f In the same
volume in which you have read the personalities you
must have seen that his infatuated admirers never
hesitated to indulge in personalities against me.

Audubon having given to the public an incorrect ac-

LETTER TO W. SWAINSON, ESQ. 191

count of himself, I had a full right to comment upon
that account, in order to show to the readers, that the
wilful inaccuracies which pervaded his autobiography
ought to be a warning to them, how they put implicit
confidence in the experiments which he says he made to
prove the vulture's deficiency in the power of scent.*
You tell us that he has silenced his opponents, and
established in the most complete manner, the accuracy
of his first assertion. How well he has succeeded, will
be seen by the note below.

K by styling- me " an Amateur" you wish your readers
to understand that I present my zoological information
gratuitously to the public — in contradistinction to your-
self, who bring your own to the market ;' — then, indeed,
the appellation might be received as a compliment ; but,
unfortunately, other passages in your work compel me
to view it in no other light than that of a decided sneer.

Let me now take a cursory view of the Amateur

* " William Sharp MacLeay, Esq., a distinguished natural-
ist, and for the last ten years a resident in the Island of Cuba,
is now in tlie United States on his way to London. Talking
of the vulture, he said, in presence of Doctors Pickery, Griffiths,
Mr. Titian Peale, and the writer of this, that ' Watertoii is
right, and Audubon is in error. The Aura (vulture) is as
common in Cuba as a barn-door fowl, and I am intimately
acquainted with its habits. It was a singular coincidence,
that on the very day in which I was reading the controversy I
had been examining some specimens of the large serpent named
Python, and had thrown the carcasses, then in a state of
putridity, into a remote part of the garden of my country
residence, five miles from the Havanna, a spot so thickly
shaded by mango bushes, that it would have been as possible
for a vulture to see through a wall as to discover by sight the
remains of the serpents ; and yet, in so short a time, I beheld
the vultures at a distance, sailing in the air, advancing towards
the garden, where they alighted, and regaled themselves upon
the stinking J'ythons.' " — Extract from a letter dated Phila-
delphia, May 18. 1836.

192 APPENDIX.

Naturalist, and then of the trading Naturalist. The
reader will not fail to perceive how much original infor-
mation Is to be acquired in the closet, and how much by
ranging through the boundless fields of nature.

To say nothing of the zoological communications to be
found in the Wanderings, I have presented to Mr.
Loudon's invaluable Magazine of Natural History above
sixty papers of original observations, made with the
gi'eatest care in Nature's lovely garden.

After years of attention to the economy of birds, I
have succeeded in getting the barn-owl, the brown owl,
the heron, the jackdaw, the magpie, the carrion crow,
the mallard, the pheasant, the starling, the woodpecker,
the ox-eye titmouse, the waterhen, the thrush, and the
blackbird, to build their nests, and take away their
young in safety, at a stone-throw of each other.

I have pointed out the duck and the drake clothed in
the same plumage only for a very short time in summer.
I have noted down the morning and the evening flight
of the rook in this district, which evolution may be seen
every day for six months in the year; and I have
cleared up the mystery of the loss of feathers, which this
useful bird experiences at the base of its bill. I have
shown which birds cover their eggs, and which birds
never cover their eggs at all, on leaving the nest. I
have shown that one hawk never molests the feathered
tribes ; and that another (scarcely to be distinguished
from this when on the wing) destroys them indis-
criminately. I have shown that the wigeon feeds by
day, eating grass like a goose ; whilst its congener, the
mallard, invariably refuses this food, and seeks for its
sustenance by night. I have given to the public an
entirely new method of preserving the eggs of birds for
cabinets ; and I have pointed out a process for preparing
insects, so that they wUl never corrupt, or be exposed

LETTER TO W. SWAINSON, ESQ. 193

to the depredations of the moth, or be affected by
damp.

I have written on the landing, the career, and the de-
predations of the Hanoverian rat in this country. I
formerly delivered in Leeds a very long lecture, to show
the necessity of reform in Museums both at home and
abroad ; proving, at the same time, how specimens might
be prepai-ed on scientific principles. I have shown hoic
a man ought to fight the feline, and how the canine,
tribe of animals. All this, and much more, has been
conveyed in language so plain and simple, that a school-
boy in rudiments can understand it.

Now let us peep into the Natural History and Clas-
sification of Birds by the Market-Naturalist.

You have given us a series of Circles, which would
puzzle Sir Isaac Newton himself; and which will tend
to scare nine-tenths of the votaries of ornithology clear
out of the field.

Your nomenclature has caused me the jaw-ache.

Gampsbnyx Swainsonii, LophophoruS, Tachipetes,
Pachycephala, Thamnophilinse, Dendrocolaptes, Myiagra
rubiculoides, Ceblepyrinse, Ptilonorynchus, Opistholo-
phus, Palseornis, Meliphagidae, Eurylaimus, Phalacroco-
rax, and a host of others.

Your criticisms are really unpardonable.

What you have given us in the book before me, con-
cerning Mr. Audubon, is utterly at variance with that
which you gave on his first arrival amongst us.* You

* In July, 1828, Mr. Swainson tells us, that Audubon
" drank of the pure stream of knowledge at its fountain
head." — See his criticism appended at the end of Audubon's
Biography of Birds. In 1836 Mr. Swainson tells us, that
Audubon's " scientific descriptions are destitute of that pre-
cision and detail which might have been expected in these
O

194 APPENDIX.

have thought fit to laud one man exceedingly for his
zoological acquirements, who, to my certain knowledge,
paid other people for the letterpress and drawings
which were to appear in his work. You raise expecta-
tions in your readei-s, that ornithological information
from Demerara (infoi-mation " passed over by the mere
Amateur") will be procured ere long by an individual
engaged in an exploring expedition up the country;
when you ought to be aware that the very nature of an
exploring expedition precludes the possibility of pro-
curing satisfactory information of birds, whose economy
is so varied, whose nidification is so mysterious, and whose
plumage is so perpetually on the change.

I myself have passed years in the heart of that country ;
still I could never obtain the least insight into the incu-
bation of the Chatterers; whilst the appearance. of some
birds, and the disappearance of others, without any visible
cause, used to puzzle me beyond measure.

I have killed the large grey pelican on the coast of
Paumaron, where it never breeds ; but I was told that
I should find its nest at the mouth of the Oronoque.
The Indians there knew nothing of its nidification;
and though the bird was plentiful at Antigua, not a soul
could direct me to its breeding-place.

Under these apparently insurmountable embarrass-
ments, I could never bring my mind to give to the public
a general history of the Demerara birds.

You might have spared yourself the lamentation, that
Demerara has only been visited by Amateurs, " whose
sole object seems to have been that of procuring perfect
skins," had you but called to your recollection the con-

days." — See Lardner's Cabinet Cyclopaedia, Natural History
of Birds; by William Swainson, Esq., vol. i. Alas ! rooR
Audubon !

LETTER TO W. SWAINSON, ESQ. 195

tents of one of your former letters to me. I had sent
you some pages, replete with notices, on the habits of
birds in Demerara. For this you returned me abundant
thanks; and having highly complimented me on the
extent of my ornithological knowledge, you begged hard
for a fresh supply; adding at the time, that I should
thus be of the utmost service to you, as you had a project
in your head of writing the history of the Demerara
birds.

Knowing that you had never been in that country,
this piece of information so astounded me, and appeared
to me so presumptuous withal, that I began to think it
was high time to drop the correspondence.

By the way, when you and I did correspond, that was
the proper time for you to have informed me that my
solution of corrosive sublimate in alcohol had failed*;
and then I would have gently pointed out to you the
error into which you had fallen. But, after I had im-
parted the discovery to you, in so liberal and so friendly
a manner, say, was it generous in you to have sealed

* " I made the following experiment with Mr. Waterton's
composition when in Brazil. The ants which swarmed in a
room I inhabited at Pernambuco had committed great ae-
vastation amongst the prepared insects and birds. Whilst
preserving one of the latter, I cut off a piece of the flesh, and
after saturating it with the composition, laid it on the path
which led to one of their holes. The little creatures seemed
at first to be somewhat suspicious of its wholesomeness ; but
after walking about and upon it, and examining it with their
antennas, they seemed to pronounce a favourable verdict, for
one and all began dragging it away to the entrance of their
nest, where it soon disappeared beneath the earthen floor.
The experiment was repeated three times, and the same result
followed. The mixture had been brought from England, and
I had no reason to believe that it was defective in the prepar-
ation," &c. — See Lardner's Cabinet Cyclnpadia, Natural Hist,
of Birds; by W. Swainson, Esq., vol. i.

196 APPENDIX.

up the supposed evidence of its failure in your vinegar-
bottle, to be squirted at me, on some future day, through
the medium of the Doctor's Cyclopcsdia ?

Your theory on parts of the plumage of birds is very
unsound.

In speaking of the vulture you remark, " But that those
parts of the bird which come in contact with its offensive
food should not be soiled and matted together ; the whole
of the head (and particularly a great part of the neck)
is entirely destitute of feathers."

When you made this erudite discovery in Nature's
economy, were you quite ignorant that the little feathery-
footed bantam, whose plumage reaches beyond the toes?
may be seen half-leg deep in dii-ty ditches, and at the
mouths of the filthiest sewers? — Why, then, should
careful Dame Nature deprive the vulture of a cravat
lest it should be soiled by carrion ; and at the same time
supply the bantam with warm stockings, which she well
knew would be encrusted with nastiness whenever there
was an opportunity to walk into it? The Dame, too,
ought to have deprived the rough-haired spaniel of his
shaggy waistcoat; for she must have known that this
brute would anoint himself with purulence from rotten
cai-rion, as often as within his reach.

Your lucubration on the eyes of the owl comes next
under consideration.

" The eyes of this bird," you say, " in the first place
are of enormous size." Nobody doubts it. " But as if
this was not sufficient," you continue, "they are sur-
rounded with two large concave disks, generally com-
posed of white and shining feathers, for the purpose of
concentrating a greater extent of light, to be reflected
upon the eye, which is placed in the centre. There can
be little doubt on this being the true use of the facial

LETTER TO W. SWAINSON, ESQ. 197

disk in owls, although the circumstance appears never
yet to have been touched upon."

I should wonder if it had.

Supposing your theory to be true, — then, indeed, has
Dame Nature most cruelly punished your "type," the
barn-owl; for even in the month of June, she dii-ects
this bird to hunt for mice ; and she shows it how to catch
them when the sun is blazing in a cloudless sky.*
This, I myself have seen repeatedly. To what intense
pain must this poor bird be doomed if its feathery " facial
disk" has the power of reflecting the burning rays of the
sun upon its eye ! If the " fecial disk" could effect this,
the barn-owl would assuredly be aware of it ; and she
would either, in common prudence, keep her room till
night-fall, or borrow a parasol to protect her eyesight
from the flaming luminary.

If the Dame judged it necessary to furnish your
"type" with this "facial disk" in order to increase its
power of nocturnal vision, we must lament that the
bittern, the heron, the wild duck, and many others have
been sadly neglected by her; for none of these birds
have that which you term facial disk, still they all search
for food in the darkest night, and wing their way in
safety through the darkest sky.

K my humble opinion of your Natural History and
Classification of Birds were asked, I should answer,
without hesitation, that many parts of it would puzzle
much clearer intellects than those contained in my own
brain-pan ; that other parts, are vastly overstrained, and
that others are exceedingly erroneous. Indeed, on a
close inspection of it, I could fancy that the whole has
been compiled from books, and from dimensions taken
from the dried skins of birds.

* " Owls ofthis group are e»»i«e?j% nocturnal." — Swainson.

1 98 APPENDIX.

Reviewers may pronounce it eminently scientific ; but
then they must only expect an assent to their decision
from the mouths of the marines ; for, " shiver my timbers,"
says Jack, " if the sailors will believe them."

I will now pass ciu'sorily on to your " Process of Pre-
servation."

I remember well the day on which your father (whom
I much respected) invited me to spend an evening at his
house in Wavertree, near Liverpool. "I have a son,"
said he to me, "who seems to have a great turn for
natural history, and I should feel much indebted to you
if you would come and spend the evening with us."
" Most willingly, Sir," said I ; and so I went to Waver-
tree.

On that evening, when I saw you for the first time, I
imparted to you whatever I thought would be of service,
as though you had been a valued and an old acquaintance.
It was then that I strongly recommended to you, for
your zoological preparations, the constant use of cor-
rosive sublimate dissolved in alcohol.

When we met again, after a considerable period, you
showed me a quantity of bird- skins which you had col-
lected in Brazil. They were exceedingly bad ; and on
looking at them, I said to myself, — Ah! I see that I must
have been beating on cold iron when I was imparting
my instructions to Mr. William.

When you found, during your stay in Pernambuco,
that the solution which you had carried out with you
from England was of no avaU against the thrice-repeated
attacks of the ants, did you not suspect that you might
possibly have got it made too weak ? Had you stepped
for a minute into the nearest chemist's shop, and pro-
cured a little more corrosive sublimate, your solution
would then have done its duty in the most satisfactory

LETTER TO W. SWAINSON", ESQ. 199

manner. When I was in the Brazilian towns and
forests, the ants never injured my specimens in Natural
History.

As you have introduced the name of Sir James Smith,
apparently to deprive me of any little merit due to the
discovery of applying this solution, tell me, candid Sir,
had you then learned, or have you since learned, that
Sir James, or any other person, had applied it to birds,
to quadrupeds, to serpents, to fishes, to wood, to clothes,
to hats, to insects, to the lining of carriages, to furs, and
to ornamental feathers ? To all which articles, I had
been in the habit of applying it for many years before
you received from me your first lesson, in your father's
house at Wavertree.

If you have ascertained the fact, then, your para-
graph in Doctor Lardner will be less objectionable;
still, give you what credit I may, methinks you have
ill-requited the former kindness of your disinterested
Mentor.

You recommend the use of arsenic soap, " from long
experience ! " and a little after you prove its deficiency,
by acknowledging that "a box, strongly impregnated
by camphor, or the oven," must be used when you find
it necessary to place your skins " in quarantine." Why
in quarantine, Mr. Swainson ? What ! — have your
skins got the plague of insects amongst them, after they
have been smeared with your wonderful arsenic soap,
which you recommend "from long experience? "

I have read over your " Process of Preservation," cer-
tainly with more attention than It deserves, and I find
it wrong at every point. I am quite prepared to prove,
that he who adopts it can never, by any chance, succeed
in producing a specimen that will bear a scientific
inspection. His preparations will be out of all shape

200 APPENDIX.

and proportion. If they should consist of birds, they
will come out of his hands, a decided deformity. If of
quadrupeds, they wiU represent hideous spectres, without
any one feature remaining similar to those which they
possessed in life.

By rejecting the solution of corrosive sublimate in
alcohol, you have most effectually deprived the operator
of a threefold and an essential advantage. By assuming
the arsenic soap, you have exposed him to injure his own
teeth ; whilst the adhesion of the soap itself to the in-
side of the skin which he is preparing will indubitably
frustrate every attempt to restore the original form and
features.

Will you meet me in some public lecture-room, and
argue this matter ? I will produce proof, sufficient to
satisfy the most incredulous person, that I am right in
what I have just advanced : and, ere we leave the room,
I trust that I shall be able to show how much I have
gained by resorting to the field of Nature, and how
much you have lost by retiring from it.

Perhaps nothing will operate so much against you, in
your zoological career, as your unlucky encomiums on
the drawings, and on the supposed writings, of Mr. Au-
dubon. Of the first (talking of his publication), you
remark, that it exhibits " a perfection In the higher
attributes of zoological painting never before attempted."
Of the last, you say, that his observations " are the
corner stones of every attempt to discover the system of
nature."

Let us peep at the drawing of the rattle-snake, In the
act of attacking a mocking-bird's nest.

After having passed the most puerile praises on that
of his Carolina doves, you exclaim : " The same poetic
sentiment and masterly execution characterise this pic-

LETTER TO W. SWAINSON, ESQ. 201

ture." Poetic — most assuredly. The whole group is
a mockery of any thing that ought to represent a correct
and faithful zoological fact. The snake is a fabulous
Hydra, with its eyes starting out of their sockets ; and
only think! the fangs are actually turned upwards,
instead of downwards.

JVIr. Audubon tells us that he confined a rattle-snake
for three years in a cage ; that he was in the habit of
feeding it; and that he measured it with accuracy.
Hence we must deem him eminently qualified to de-
scribe correctly this well-known reptile. Mr. Swainson
too, a learned doctor in zoology, who constantly refers
us to his own works, has no slight pretensions, one
would suppose, to speak authoritatively on such a
subject.

But with this chimerical rattle- snake before us, what
must we think of the artist who figured it ? or of the
critic who lauds it to the skies ? With this thing of
phantasy staring us in the face, what guarantee have we
for the correctness of one single production from the
crayon of John James Audubon, F. R. SS. L. & E. ?
or what pledge for the soundness of one line of cri-
ticism, from the pen of William Swainson, Esq. A. C. G.
R R.S. L.S.?

When you meet Mr. Audubon, you might just ask
him whether this outrageous group of his was the efl'ect
of sheer ignorance, or whether he manufactured it
through a mischievous inclination to play upon the inex-
perience of his customers ? But no, that won't do ; for
your friend is acute enough in some things ; and he may
possibly put a similar question to yourself, on the score
of ignorance, or of delinquency in criticism. This, you
know, would throw you into a quandary. Ah, well-a-
day, how cruelly has this American snake of Audu-

202 APPENDIX.

bon's bitten our wise men of London and of modern
Athens !

I have always been of opinion that it was your hand
(see Loudon's Magazine of Natural History, vol. vi.
p. 550) which guided young Audubon's pen against me
in the aifair of the vulture's nose ; and I have purposely
introduced your unfortunate encounter with his father's
rattle-snake by way of balancing the account.

Believe me, Sir, you have a vast deal to learn before
you become an adept in ornithology. Fidelity and sim-
plicity are all that is wanted to render this pleasing
study attainable to every one. But you seem to think
otherwise. However, let me tell you frankly that the
admeasurement of ten thousand dried bird-skins with
a subsequent and vastly complicated theory on what you
conceive you have drawn from the scientific operation of
your compasses will never raise your name to any per-
manent altitude. You seem, formerly, to have had a
foresight of what I have just announced to you; for, in
speaking of Wilson and Audubon, you exclaim, " Their
writings will be consulted when our favourite theories
shall have passed into oblivion." See your own review
of Audubon, which he has appended to his first volume
of the Biography of Birds.

But it is now full time to draw to a close, and to leave
other errors for another day.

We are told that Nature is the best of guides. I be-
lieve it.

Climb then, with me, the loftiest trees ; range the
dreary swamp; pursue the wild beasts over hUl and
dale ; repair to alluvial mud-flats ; follow the wind-
ings of creeks, and of the sea-shore ; and get yourself
let down the tremendous precipice in quest of zoological
knowledge. Worst come to the worst, — this will at

LETTER TO W. SWAINSON, ESQ. 203

least gain you the appellation of "Amateur" from the
pen of supercilious theorists, — an honour not to be
sneezed at in these our latter times.

During your peregrinations, should you chance to fall
in with your American friend, — ^who, you inform us, has
pursued painting and the study of Nature "with a
genius and an ardour of which, in their united effects,
there is no parallel," — do not fail to ask him how it
came to pass that when he added so largely to the wing
of his bird of Washington, he quite forgot to supply its
tail with a proportional elongation.

If you find him communicative and in a good humour,
you might have a chat with him about his great horned
owl, which, " at the least noise, erects the tufts of its
head." Our owls depress their tufts when disturbed.
But, for the life of you, don't say one word about the
multifarious group of wild beasts, which were present
till after day-break at the great pigeon slaughter ; where,
he says, the noise was so deafening, that "even the
reports of the guns were seldom heard." This would
put him out of temper, and it might lead to " unjusti-
fiable personalities," by seeming to question his veracity.

I trust you are now convinced that, when you feel
averse to place a man's name in a favourable point
of view, and at the same time have no absolute necessity
for putting it in an unfavourable one, the safest plan to
be pursued is to place it in no view at all. Had you
not introduced me to Doctor Lardner in so unhandsome
a manner, I should have been the last man in the world
to interrupt you in your complicated theory of circles,
and of types primary, types aberrant, types grallatorial,
types tenulrostral, types rasorial, and types suctorial.

In truth, I should really consider it lost time in me
were I to descant on the incomprehensibility of your

204 APPENDIX.

favourite theories, seeing that they have already heard
the solemn proclamation of their death-warrant from
your own lips. ( Vide foregoing page of this Letter.)

I could wish to introduce a word or two here, on
your want of knowledge concerning the habits and ana-
tomy of the Toucan, but am obliged for the present to
defer them.

I am. Sir,
Your obedient servant,

Charles Watekton.
Walton.IIaU, March 10. 1837.

THE END.

Printed by A. Spottiswoodb,
New- Street- Square.

A LIST

NEW WORKS IN MISCELLANEOUS LITERATURE

Mr. WATERTON'S ESSAYS on NATURAL HIS-
TORY, and Autobiography. First Series. Fifth edition.
Foolscap 8vo. 8s.

II.

Mrs. LOUDON'S LADY'S COUNTRY COM-
PANION; or, How to enjoy a Country Life rationally-
Second Edition. Foolscap Svo. with Illustrations, 7s. 66?.
III.

LOUDON'S ENCYCLOPEDIA of GARDENING;
its History and Present State, its Theory and Practice. New
Edition. Svo. with 1,000 Woodcuts, 50s.

IV.

LOUDON'SENCYCLOPEDIAof AGRICULTURE;

the Theory and Practice of Cultivation, the Economy and
Management of Farms. Fifth Edition. 8vo. with 1,100
Woodcuts, 50s.

v.
LOUDON'S ENCYCLOPEDIA of PLANTS; in-
cluding all found in or introduced into Great Britain. New
Edition. Svo. with 10,000 Woodcuts, 73s. 6d.

VI.

LOUDON'S HORTUS BRITANNICUS. Third
Edition, with Supplement by Messrs. Loudon, Baxter, and
Don. Svo. 31s. 6c?.

VII.

LOUDON'S ENCYCLOPEDIA of COTTAGE,
FARM, and VILLA ARCHITECTURE and FUR-
NITURE. New Edition. Svo. with 2,000 Woodcuts, 63s.

VIII.

LOUDON'S SELF-INSTRUCTION for YOUNG
GARDENERS, Foresters, Bailiffs, Land Stewards, and
Farmers. Svo. with Portrait and Woodcuts, 7s. 6d.

New Works printed for Longman and Co.

LOUDON'S Edition of the Works of the late Humphry
Repton, Esq. on LANDSCAPE GARDENING, and
LANDSCAPE ARCHITECTURE. 8vo. with Portrait
and Woodcuts, 30s. ; coloured, 31. 6s.

LOUDON'S ARCHITECTURAL MAGAZINE ;

complete in 5 vols. 8vo. with Woodcuts, 61. 6s.

XI.

LOUDON'S SUBURBAN GARDENER, and VILLA
COMPANION. 8vo. with Woodcuts, 20s.

XII.

LOUDON on the LAYING OUT, PLANTING, &c.
of CEMETERIES and CHURCHYARDS. 8vo. with
Wood Engravings, 12s.

XIII.

LOUDON'S ENCYCLOPAEDIA of the HARDY
TREES and SHRUBS of GREAT BRITAIN, Native
and Foreign. 8vo. with 2,000 Woodcuts, 50s.

XIV.

LOUDON'S ARBORETUM BRITANNICUM. New

Edition, corrected. 8 vols. 8vcv with 400 8vo. Plates of Trees
and 2,500 Woodcuts, lOl.

XV.

The Right Hon. T. B. MACAULAY'S CRITICAL
and HISTORICAL ESSAYS. Third Edition. 3 vols.
8vo. 36s.

XVI.

LORD JEFFREY'S CONTRIBUTIONSto the EDIN-
BURGH REVIEW. 4 vols. 8vo. 48s.

XVII.

The WORKS of the Rev. SYDNEY SMITH. Third
Edition, with Additions. 3 vols. 8vo. with Portrait, 36s.

SIR JAMES MACKINTOSH'S MISCELLANEOUS
WORKS. Collected and Edited by his Son. 3 vols. 8vo.

XIX.

LADY CALLCOTT'S SCRIPTURE HERBAL.
Square crown-Svo. with upwards of 120 Wood Engravings,
25s.

New Works printed for Longman and Co.

XX.

GOOD'S BOOK OF NATURE. A Popular Illus-
tration of the General Laws and Phenomena of Creation.
Third Edition. 3 vols. fcap. 8vo. 24s.

XXI.

Dr. TURTON'S MANUAL of the LAND and FRESH-
WATER SHELLS of the BRITISH ISLANDS. New
Edition. Post 8vo. with coloured Plates and Woodcuts. 15s.

XXII.

GRAY and MITCHELL'S GENERA of BIRDS.

Imperial 4to. with 350 plain and coloured Plates. Parts I.
to XXI. 10s. 6c?. each. To be completed in 50 Monthly
Parts.

XXIII.

POPULAR CONCHOLOGY; or, the Shell Cabinet
arranged. By Agnes Catlow. Fcap. 8vo. with 312 Wood-
cuts, 10s. 6d.

XXIV.

KIRBY and SPENCE'S INTRODUCTION to EN-
TOMOLOGY. Sixth Edition. 2 vols. 8vo. 31s. 6d

WESTWOOD'S INTRODUCTION to the MODERN

CLASSIFICATION of INSECTS. 2 vols. 8vo. with
Illustrations, 21. Is.

XXVI.

The Rev. R. H. NEWELL'S ZOOLOGY of the
ENGLISH POETS. Fcap. 8vo. with Woodcuts, 5s. 6d.

xxvir.
STABLE TALK and TABLE TALK ; or. Spectacles
for Young Sportsmen. By Harry Hieover. 8vo. 12s.

XXVIII.

BLAINE'S ENCYCLOPEDIA of RURAL SPORTS,
Hunting, Shooting, Fishing, Racing, &c. 8vo. with 600
Woodcuts, 50s.

XXIX.

COLONEL HAWKER'S INSTRUCTIONS to
YOUNG SPORTSMEN in all that relate to Guns and
Shooting. Ninth Edition. 8vo. with Illustrations, 21 s.

XXX.

JOHNSON'S FARMERS ENCYCLOPEDIA, and
Dictionary of Rural Affairs. 8vo. with Woodcuts, 50s.

New Works printed for Longman and Co.

PROFESSOR LOW'S ELEMENTS of PRACTICAL
AGRICULTURE. Fourth Edition. 8vo. with 200
Woodcuts, 21s.

xxxu.

PROFESSOR LOW on LANDED PROPERTY
and the ECONOMY of ESTATES. 8vo. with Wood
Engravings, 21s.

xxxiu.

PROFESSOR LOW on the DOMESTICATED
ANIMALS of the BRITISH ISLANDS. 8vo. with
Engravings on Wood, 25s.

XXXIV.

WEBSTER and PARKES'S ENCYCLOPAEDIA of
DOMESTIC ECONOMY; Housekeeping, Furnishing,
Cookery, &c. 8vo. with 1,000 Woodcuts, 50s.

XXXV.

MISS ACTON'S MODERN COOKERY in all its

Branches, reduced to a System of easy Practice. Fifth Edition.
Fcap. 8vo. with Illustrations, 7s. 6d.

XXXVI,

MAUNDER'S TREASURY of KNOWLEDGE and
LIBRARY of REFERENCE. Sixteenth Edition, en-
larged. Fcap. 8vo. 10s.; in embossed binding, 12s.

XXXVII.

MAUNDER'S SCIENTIFIC and LITERARY
TREASURY. Fourth Edition, enlarged. Fcap. 8vo. 10s.;
in embossed binding, 12s.

xxxvui.

MAUNDER'S HISTORICAL TREASURY. Second
Edition. Fcap. 8vo. 10s. ; in embossed binding, 12s.
xxxix.

MAUNDER'S BIOGRAPHICAL TREASURY.
Fifth Edition, corrected and enlarged, Fcap. 8vo. 10s. ; in
embossed binding, 12s.

XL.

M'CULLOCH'S GEOGRAPHICAL DICTIONARY.

A new Edition. 2 vols. 8vo. with Six large Maps, 4Z.

*^* Supplement, to complete the former Edition, price 5s.

LONDON : Longman, Brown, Greenland Longmans.

October, 3.846.

A CATALOGUE OF

NEW WORKS AND NEW EDITIONS

PRINTED FOR

MESSRS., LONGMAN, BROWN, GREEN, AND LONGMANS,
LONDON.

CLASSIFIED INDEX.

AGRICULTURE & RURAL AFFAIRS.

Pages
Bayldoii on Vaiuing^Rents, etc. - - 6
Crocker's Land Surveying - - - 9

Davy's Agricultural Chemistry - - 9

Greenwood's (Col.) Tree-IJfter - - 12
Johnson's Farmer's Encyclopeedia - - 15
Loudon's Encyclopaedia of Agriculture - 18
,, Self-Instruction for Farmers, etc. 18
„ (Mrs.) Lady 'sCountry Companion IS
Lovf's BreedsoftheDomesticatcdAnimals 19
F.lementsofAgr^

On Landed Property

On the Do

Animals"

Fattening Cattle, et

ARTS, MANUFACTURES, AND
ARCHITECTURE.

Brande's Dictionary of Science, etc. -
Buckler's St. Alban's Abbey -
Budge's Miner's Guide . - - .
Cartoons (The Prize) . . - -

Oresy's Encycl. of Civil Engineering
De Burtin on the Knowledge of Pictures
Gwilt's Encyclopsedia of Architecture
Haydon's Lectures on Painting & Design
Holland's Manufactures in Metal
Lerebours On Photography - . -
Loudon's Rural Architecture -
Moseley's Engineering and Architecture
Porter's Manufacture of Silk -

,, ,, Porcelain & Glass

Reid (Dr.) on Warming and Ventilating
Steam Engine (The) , by the Artisan Club
Lire's Dictionary of Arts, etc.

BIOGRAPHY.

Aikin's Life of Addison - - - .
Bell's Lives of the British Poets -
Dover's Life of the King of Prussia -
Dunham's Early Writers of Britain

,, Lives of the British Dramatists

Forster's Statesmen of the Commonwealth
LifeofJebb ....
Gleig's British IMilitary Commanders
Grant (Mrs.) Memoir and Correspondence
James's Life of the Black Prince -
,, Eminent Foreiaii Statesmen
L41's (M.) Life of Dost'Mohammed -
Leslie's Life of Constable
Life of a Travelling Physician
Mackintosh's Life of Sir T. More
Mannder's Biographical Trea
Mignet's Antonio "

Roberts's Life of the Duke of Monmouth
Roscoe's Lives of Eminent British Lawye

*Philip II

ch Writers
i of the British Adn
if Wesley -

BOOKS OF GENERAL UTILITY.

Acton's (Eliza) Cookery Book ■ - 5

Black's Treatise on Brewing ... 6

,, Supplement on Bavarian Beer - 6

Collegian's Guide 8

Donovan's Domestic Economy - - 10

Hand-Book ofTaste . - - . )3

Hints on Etiquette 1.3

Hudson's Parent's Hand-Book - - 15

,, Executor's Guide - - • 15

On Making Wills ... is

Loudon's Self Instruction - - - 18

„ (Mrs.) Amateur Gardener - 1?

Maunder's Treasury of Knowledge - - 20

,, Scientific and LiteraryTreasury 21

„ Treasury of History - - 21

,, Biographical Treasury - - 20

Parkes's Domestic Duties - ' - - 23

Pycroft's Course of English Reading - 24

Reader's Time Tables - - - - 25

Riddle's Eng.-Lat. and Lat.-Eng. Diet. - 25

Robinso n's Art of Curing, Pickling, etc. 26

Rowton's Debater 26

Short Whist ------ 27

Thomson's Management of Sick Room - 30

,, Interest Tables - - - 30

Tomlins' Law Dictionary - - - - 30

Walker's Dictionary, by Smirt - - 31

Webster's Encycl. of Domestic Economy 32

BOTANY AND GARDENING.

Abercrombie's Practical Gardener -

and Main's Gardener
Callcott's Scripture Herbal
Conversations on Botanv
Drummond's First Steps to Botany -
Glendinning On the Pine Apple
Greenwood's (Col.) Tree-Litter
Henslow's Botany - - - .
Hoare On the Grape Vint on Open Wall

,, On the Boots of Vines -
Hooker's British Flora -

,, andTaylor'sMuscologiaBrit
Jackson's Pictorial Flora -
Lindley's Tlieorv of Horticulture
,, Orchard and Kitchen Can
,, Introduction to Botany
,, Flora Medica ....
,, Synopsis of British Flora -
Loudon's Hortus Britannicus -

,, Hortus Lignosus Londinensis
„ Encyclopa:dia of Trees & Shrub

,, ,, Plants -

,, Suburban Gardener -

,, Self-Instruction for Gardeners

(Mr.) Amateur Gardener -

Landscape Gard

Rcpto

i Guid

London: Printed by M- Mason, Ivy Lane, Paternoster Eow.

CLASSIFIED

Rogers's Vegetable Cultivator - - - 26

Schleideu's Scientific Botany - - - 26

Smith's Introduction to Botany - - 2/

,, Enulisli Flora . . - - 27

,, Compendium of English Flora - 27

CHRONOLOGY.

Blair's Chronological Tables - - - 6

Nicolas's Chronology of History - - 23

Riddle's Ecclesiastical Chronology - - 25

Tate's Horatius Restituius - - - 29

COMMERCE AND MERCANTILE
AFFAIRS.

Baylis's Arithmetic of Annuities - - 6

(iilbart On Banking - - - - H

Lorimer's Letters to a Master Mariner - 17

M'Culloch's Dictionary of Commerce - 20

Rcitder's Time Tables - - - - "-a

Steel's Shipmaster's Assistant - - - 28

Tate's Nnval Book-keeping - - - 29

Thomson's Tables of Interest - . - 30

VValford's Customs' Laws . - - 31

GEOGRAPHY AND ATLASES.

Butler's Ancient and Modern Geography 7
„ Atlas of Modern Geography
,, ,, Ancient Geography

„ „ General Geography

Cooley's World Surveyed
De Strzelecki's New South Wales -
Forster's Historical Geography of Arabi;
Hall's Large General Atlas
M'CuUoch's Geographical Dictionary
Murray's F.ncyclop;cdia of Geography
Ordnance Maps, and Publications of th

Geological Society
Parrot's Ascent of Mount Ararat -

HISTORY AND CRITICISM

Adair's (SirR.) Mission to Vienna -

" Constantinople -
Addison's History of the Knights -rempla

Bell's History

Blair's Chron. and Historical Tables

Bloomfield's Translation of Thucydides

,, Edition of Thucydides -

Cooley's Maritime and Inland Discovei

Crowe's History of France

Dahlmann's English Revolution

De Sismoudi's Fall of the Roman Empire 10

„ Italian Republics - - 10

Dunham's History of Spain and Portugal 10

„ Europe in the Middle Ages - 10

„ History of the German Empire 10

„ Denmark, Sweden, and Norway 10

,, History of Poland - - - 10

Dunlop's History of Fiction - - 10

Eccleston's English Antiquities - - 10

Fergus's United States of America - 11

Grant (Mrs.) Memoir andCorespondence 12

Grattan's History of Netherlands • - 12

Grimblot's William IIL and Louis XIV. 12

Guicciardini's Hist. Maxims - - - 13

Halsted's Life of Richard in. - - 13

Haydon's Lectures on Pain tin gaud Design 13

Historical Pictures of the Middle Ages

Hojsley's _(Bp.) Bi- ■■ '

Keightley's Outlines of History
Laing's Kings of Norway
Lempri&re's Clas.^ical Dictionary
Macaulay's Essays -
Mackinnon's History of Civilisation
Mackintosh's History of Eicgland -
,, MisceflaneouS Works

M'CuUoch's Dictionary, Historical, Ge
graphical, and Statistical

- 15
. 16

Maunder's Treasury of History
Mignefs Antonio Perez and Philip II.
:h History ■

History -
Mijller's Mytliology - - - -
Nicolas's Chronology of History
Ranke's History of the Reformation
Roberts's Duke of Monmouth -
Rome, History of - - - -
" "* " ;dford Correspondence -

Scott's Hi

Siunett's Byivays of History - - - 27

Stebbing's History of the Christian Church 28

,, History of the Reformation - 28

,, Church History - - - 28

Switzerland, History of - - - - 29

Sydney Smith's Works - . - - 27

Thirhvall'sHistorv of Greece - - - 29

Tooke's History of Prices - . - 30

Turner's History of F.ngland - - - 31

Tytler's Elements of General History - 31

Zumpt's Latin Grammar - - - - 32

JUVENILE BOOKS.

Amy Herbert

Boy's (The) Own Book -

Gertrude -

Gower's Scientific Phenomena
Hawes's Tales of the N. American Ii
Howitt's Boy's Country Book -
Laneton Parsonage . - - -
Mackintosh's Life of Sir T. More
Marcet's Conversations—

On the History of England

On Natural Philosophy
On Political Economy
On Vegetable Physiology
On Laiid and Water -

Pycroft's Course of English Reading

MEDICINE.

Bull's Hints to Mothers -

„ Management of Children
Copland's Dictionary of Medici
Elliotson's Human Physiology
Esdaile's Mesmerism in India .
Holland's Medical Notes -
Lane's Water Cure at Malvern

Per.

V On Fo

Recce's Medi
Sandby On Mesmc
Thomson on Food

Gui(

MISCELLANEOUS.

cartoons (The Prize) .... 8

Clavers's Forest Life .... 8

Cocks's Bordeaux, its Wines, etc. - - 8

Collegian's Guide ----- 8

Colton's Lacon S

De Burtin On the Knowledge of Pictures 9

De Morgan On Probabilities - - - 10

De Strzelecki's New South Wales - - 10

Dunlop's History of Fiction - - - 10

Good's Book of Nature - - - - 12

Gowc's Scientific Phenomena - . 12

Graham's English - - - - 12

Grant's I^etters from the Mountains - 12

Guest's Mabinoeion 13

Hand-Book of Taste . . - . 13

Hobbcs's (Thos.) complete Works - 14

tESSRS. LONGMAN AND CO.'s CATALOGUE.

Pages

Hewitt's Rural Life of England - - 14

„ Visits to Remarkable Places - 14

,, Student Life of Germany - - 14

,, RuialandSocialLife of Germany 14

,, Colonisation and Cliristianity - 14

Jeffrey's (l-ord) Contributions . ' - 15

King's (Col.) Argentine Republic - - Ifi

Lane's Lite at tlie Water Cure - - 16

Life of a I'raveiliiig Physician - - - 16
Loudon's (.Mrs.) Lady's Country Companion 17

Macaulay's Critical and Historical Essays 19
M'lctiiiitosli's 'Sir J.) Miscellaneous Works 19

IMaitland-s Churcli in Catacombs - - 20

Micheiet's Priests, Women, and Families 21

The People . ... 21

Miiller's Mythology ----- 22

NeckerOeSaussure's on Education - 22

Perry l)n German University Education - 23

Peter Plymley's Letters - - - - 24

Pycroft's English Course of Reading - 24

Rogefs Economic Chess-board - - 26

R.nvton's Debater - . - . 26

Sandby On Mesmerism - - - - 26

SaEidlord's Parochialia - - - - 26

Seaward's Narrative of his Shipwreck - 26

Southey's Common-Place Book - - 28

„ The Doctor - - - - 28

Sydney Smith's Works - . - - 27

Taylor's Statesman .... 29

Thomson on Food of Animals, etc. - - 30

Walker's Chess Studies - - - - 31

Welsford On the English Language - 32

Willooghby's (Lady) Diary - - - 32
Zumpt's Latin Grammar - - - .32

NATURAL HISTORY IN GENERAL.

Callow's Popular Concholog
Doubleday's Butte. "
Drununond's Letters to a Natural
Gray's Figures of Molluscous Am
,, ami Mitchell's Ornithology
'"rby and Spence's Entomology

Moths

Lee's Taxide

- 10

Malaco

Habits

Taxide

1 Shells of tl

Zoology of H.M. S.s' Erebus and Terror 32

NOVELS AND WORKS OF FICTION.

Pericles,
Southey's
Willis s (

ONE VOLUWIE ENCYCLOP/EDIAS
AND DICTIONARIES.

Blaine's, of Rural Sports .... 6
Brando's, of Science, Literature, and Art 7

Irs.) Novels - -
H.Story of Fiction -

- 7

- 10

Russell .

. iu

Masterman Ready -

- 20

Settlers in Canada -

- •'"

Africa

20

A Tale of Athens

- 23

, The Doctor, etc. -

. 28

N.P.) Dashes at Life

- 32

Copland's, of Medicine - . - - 9

Cresy's, of Civil Engineering - - - 9

Gwilt's, of Architecture - - - - 13

Johnson's Farmer - - - - - 15

Loudon's.of Trees and Shrubs - - 18

,, ofGardeniiig - - - IS

,, of Agriculture - - - . 18

„ of Plants - - ... 18

;, of Rural Architecture - - IS

M'CuUoch's Geographical Dictionary - 19

,, • Dictionary of Commerce - 20

Murrav'sEncyclopffidiaofGeography - 22

Ure's Arts, IMauufautures, and Mines - 31

Webster's Domestic Economy . - 32

POETRY AND THE DRAMA.

Aikin's (Dr.) British Poets - - . 26

Ballads of the East 6

Biirger's Leonora, by Cameron - - /

Chalenor's Walter Gray . . - - 8

,, Poetical Remains - - - 8

Collier's Roxburghe Ballads ... 8

Costello's Persian Rose Garden - - 9

Dante, translated by Wright - - - 9

Goldsmith's Poems 12

Gray's Elegy, illuminated - - - 12

Horace, by Tate 29

Howitt's (Mary) Ballads - - . 15

L. E. L.'s Poetical Works ... 17

Linwood's Anthologia Oxoniensis - 17

Macaulay's Lavs of Ancient Rome - - 19

Mackay's Ensli^h Lakes - - . . 19

Montgomery's Poetical Works - - 21

Moore's Poetical Works - ... 21
„ LallaRookh - - - .22

„ Irish Melodies - - - . 22

Moral of Flowers .... - 22

Poet's Pleasaunce 24

Pope's Works 24

Reynard the Fox . - - . - 25

Shakspeare, by Bowdler - . . 27

Sheldon's Minstrelsy .... 27

Sophocles, by Linwood - - - - 27

Southey's Poetical Works - - . '28

„ Oliver Newman . - . 28

„ British Poets - - - - 26

Spirit of the Woods - ... 28

Thomson's Seasons ... - 29

Turner's Richard 111. ... - 31

Watts's (A.A.) LyricsoftheHeart - 32

POLITICAL ECONOMY AND
STATISTICS.

Gilbart on Banking - - . . - 11
M'Culloch's Geographical, Statistical, and

Historical Dictionary - . . 19

M'Cnlloch's Dictionary of Commerce - 20

„ Literature of Polit. Economy 19

„ On T.ixation and Funding - 19

,, Statistics of the British Empire 19

Marat's Conversatiocis on Polit. Economy 20

Thornton on Over population - . .30

Tooke's History of Prices - . - 30

Twiss's Ore^on Question Examined - 31

RELIGIOUS AND MORAL
WORKS, ETC.

Amy Herbert, edited by Rev W. Sewell 5

Bailey's Essays on the Pursuit of Truth . 6

Bloomlield's Greek Testament - . 7

,, College and School ditto 7

,, Lexicon to Greek Testament 7

Burns's Christian Philosophy ... 7

,, Christian Fragments - - - 7

Callcott's Scripture Herbal - - - 8

Dale's Domestic Liturgy - - - 9

Dibdin's Sunday Library - ... 10

CLASSIFIED INDEX.

Doddridge's Family Expositor - - 10

Knglishman's Hebrew Concordance - 11

„ Greek Concordance - - 11

Etheridije's Syrian Churches - - 11

Fitzroy's (Lad'y) Scripture Conversations 11

Forster's Historical Geography of Arabia 11

„ Life of Bishop Jebb ... 11

From Oxford to Rome - - - - 11

Gertrude, edited by the Rev. \V. Sewell - 11

Hook's (Dr.) Lectures on Passion Week 14

Home's Introduction to the Scriptures - 14

„ Compendium of ditto - - 14

Horsley's (Bp.) Biblical Criticism - - 14

,, Psalms ----- 14

Jebb's -Protestant Kempis - - - 15

„ Pastoral In&tructinus - 15

,, Correspondence with Knox 15

Knox's (Alexander) Remains - - - 16

Laing's Notes on the German Schism - ]6

Laneton Parsonage ----- 16

Letters to my Unknown Friends - "17

Maitland's Church in the Catacombs - 20

Blarriage Gift ...--- iO

Michelet's Priests, Women, and Families 21

ndQu

Milner's Church History -
Moore on the Power of the Soul

„ on the Use of the Body
Mosheim's Ecclesiastical History
Pnrables (The)
Parkes's Domestic Duties
Peter Plymley's Letters -
Pitman's Sermons on the Psalms
(Juinet's Christianity
Kiddle's Letters from a Godfather
Kobinsou's Greek and Knglish L
Saudford On Female Improvement
„ On Woman
„ 's Parochialia -
Sermon on the Mount (The) -
Shepherd's Horae Apostolicse
Smith's Female Disciple -

,, (G.) PerilousTimes -

Stebbing's Church History - • - S
Sydney Smith's Sermons - - - i

Tate's History of St. Paul . . . ;

Tayler's(Rev.C.B.)Margaret; or, the Pearl i

',', ,',' DoraMelder -

,, ,, Lady Mary

Taylor's (Jeremy) Works
Tomline's Christian Theology -

„ Introduction to the Bible

TroUope's Analecta Theologica
Turner's Sacred History
Wardlaw On Sociniai. Controversy
Weil's Bible, Koran, and Talmud -
Whilley's Life Everlasting
Wilberforce's View of Christianity
Wilioughby's (Lady) Diary -

RURAL SPORTS.

Blaine's Dictionary of Sports . . . g

Hansard's Fishing in Wales - - 13

Hawker's Instructions to Sportsmen - 13

Loudon's (Mrs.) Lady's Country Companion 18

Stable Talk and Table Talk • - - 28

THE SCIENCES IN GENERAL,
AND MATHEMATICS.

Bakewell's Introduction to Geology - 6

Balmain's Lessons on Chemistry - - 6

Brando's Dictionary of Science, etc. - 7

Brewster's Optics 7

De la Beche on theGcologr of Cornwall, etc. 9

Donovan's Chemistry - - " " iS

Elliot's Geometry JO

Farey on the Steam Engine - - ' \]

Fosl>roke on the Arts of the Ancients - 11

Gower's Scientific Phenomena - - 1-

Greener on the Gun - - - - 1'^
Herschel's Natural Philosophy - -13

Holland's Manufactures in Metal - - 14

Humboldt's Cosmos . - - - 15

Hunt's Researches on Light . - - 15

Kane's Elements of Chemistry - - 15

Kater and Lardner's Mechanics - - 16

La Place's System of the World - - 16

Lardner's Cabinet Cyclopsedia - - 16

,, Hydrostatics and Pneumatics - 16

„ and Walker's Electricity - 16

„ Arithmetic - - - - 16

„ Geometry - - - - 16

„ Treatise on Heat - . - 16

Lerebours On Photography - - - 17

Lloyd On Light and Vision - - - 1"

Low's Chemistry ----- IS

Mackenzie's Physiology of Vision - - 19

Marcet's Conversations on the Sciences, 20

Memoirs of the Geological Survey - - 21

Moseley's Practical Mechanics . - 22

,, Engineering and Architecture 22

Nesbit's Mensuration . - . - 22

Owen's Lectures On Comparative Anatomy 23

Pearson's Practical Astronomy - - 23

Peschel's Physics 24

Phillips'sPalaiOzoicFossilsof Cornwall, etc. 24

„ Guide I ' "

,, Treatil

,, Introduction to Mineralogy - 24

Poisson's Mechanics - - - - 24

Portlock's Geology of Londonderry - 24

Powell's Natural Philosophy . - - 24

QuarterlyJourual of theGeological Society 24

Ritchie (Robert) on Railways - - 25

Roberts's Dictionary of Geology - - 25

Thomson's Algebra . - . - 30

TRAVELS.

Allan's Mediterranean - - - - 6

Cooley's World Surveyed - - - g

Costello's (Miss3 North Wales - - 9

De Custine's Russia - . - - q

Di Strzelecki's New South Wales - - 10

Erman's Travels through Siberia - - 8

Harris's Highlands of jKtbiopia - - 13

Howitt's (R.) Australia Felix - - I5

King's (Col.) Argentine Republic - - 16

Laing's Notes of a Traveller - - - 16

„ Touriu Sweden - - - - 16
a Travel
Mackay's Englil
Montauban's Wanderii ^
Parrot's Ascent of Mount Ararat -
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