less carcass of the worm."* The carcass of the worm is by no means so helpless as here described. It is true that the tentacles are employed to drag the animal along. You observe how that one is crawling up the sides of the glass, and now hangs suspended to the floating weed; but you may also observe him wriggling about his body with great activity, and by these contractions he is enabled to make progress, even when deprived of his tentacles. There is a more serious objection, however, to be made to the passage I have just abridged. Dr Williams-in common with most, if not all, anatomists-speaks of the muscular parietes of these tentacles. I venture to suggest that there is great inaccuracy in the term; and that the existence of these muscles is a pure assumption, assumed to explain the contractility of these organs, in the same way as a nervous system is constantly assumed to explain some phenomena of sensibility, although not a trace of a nerve can be detected by the highest powers of the microscope. The assumption is in each case perfectly needless, and very misleading. It is against all philosophy thus to assume the existence of a tissue no one can detect, to explain a phenomenon which may be otherwise explained. Nor is anything gained by declaring that the nervous tissue is in a "diffused state." This is making an assumption and concealing it in a phrase. If I were to declare that gun cotton contained nitre, because gunpowder contains it; and if, when my statement was answered by repeated analyses proving no nitre to be there, I were to reply, "the nitre may not be detected by your analysis, because it is in a diffused state," you would shrug contempt at such chemistry. But this is precisely analogous to what is done daily with respect to nervous tissue. Men assume that all animals must have nerves; if the nerves are not visible, it is because they are diffused." Now, this reasoning is not only vicious as logic, it is particularly vicious in Biology, where structure is of equal importance with

*

composition. Nerve is a specific thing, having a specific composition and a specific structure; to talk of this thing as "diffused," is to talk of it as wanting one of its constituent characters; it is like talking of fluid crystals, or square circles. All this Dr Williams, I am sure, would be the first to admit, for he doubts the existence of nerves even in the echinodermata; and I would ask him whether the tentacles of the Terebella are not assumed to have muscles, in accordance with the current notions that wherever there is contractility the existence of muscles must be inferred? I put the question as a question merely. My own observations utterly failed to detect muscular fibres in the tentacles of the species I examined; and this negative result is supported by the fact of these tentacles remaining a whole week undecomposed when separated from the animal, which could hardly have been the case had they been muscular.

But enough of anatomy for this morning! The lovely lanes of Ilfracombe invite us, and we may cool our overheated brows by a delicious breeze blowing over the Tors; or perhaps the noble sweep of Tenby sands seduces us to walk to Giltar Point. A bottle or two will be useful in either expedition; a small basket will be worth the trouble of carriage if we take the sands, for there was a gale last night, and who knows what may have been thrown up by it? And if you trust to your hands to carry all you may find, you will, perhaps, be the "observed of all observers," as I was, carrying a large cuttlefish in each hand, while some compassionate sailors superfluously assured me, "Them's not good to eat, sir!" Another day I transported a dogfish through the streets-much to the horror of all the flounces, and the ineffable scorn of all the pink shirts and telescopes. You may be as indifferent to the stares and the scorns of flounces and telescopes as I was, but still I say, out of mere convenience, carry a phial, if not a basket. On one me

morable afternoon we came upon, and almost stepped upon, an adder lying just outside the hedge. All is grist to the naturalist's mill, so I cut off the adder's head, and wrapped it in my pocket-handkerchief." Presently we came unto a pleasant pond, the surface of which, with its varied greenth of scum, was so full of promise that there burst from me a sudden Oh! which startled, and not a little puzzled, a lazy countryman, taking his siesta by looking at nothing over a gate.

"Here's a pond!" Iexclaimed, when reason got the better of emotion. "Ah!" responded my companion, profoundly sympathetic.

The countryman was bewildered. Were we insane? or only Cockneys? There was a pond, sure enough, and as dirty a bit o' water as you'd wish to see; and what then? Were we frogs from the desert, that a pond should agitate us?

While he was cracking this very hard nut, harder than his own Devonshire skull, I had emerged from the bitterness of self-reproach at having forgotten a phial, into the clearness of triumphant resource. Seizing a large dock-leaf and converting it into the rude resemblance of a bag, I hooked up with my stick a string of tempting scum, packed it up in the leaf, and walked on wealthy. To his dying day that countryman will recount, to all who will listen, the inconceivable fancy of the gentry folks, who carried off the filth of a pond in a dock-leaf. A queer start, warn't it?

Where shall we ramble? At Ilfracombe the question is really puzzling, because so many lovely walks solicit you. Go where you will, you cannot miss a lovely walk, that is some comfort; but there is an embarrassment of riches. Towards the close of spring, when the trees are in full leaf, but still keep their delicate varieties of colour-varieties lost in the fulness of summer, to be regained with even greater beauty in autumn, at this time, when the furze is in all its golden glory, perpetually tempting one to pluck a tuft of blossoms as the largest specimen ever seen, and scenting the air all round, Ilfracombe is enchanting. So it is in summer; but the loss of

the furze is almost like the fading away of the evening red. Contemporary with the furze is the lovely primrose, here seen to perfection, covering the hill-sides with pale stars, almost as plentifully as buttercups and daisies elsewhere. In such a season the walk to Lee, combining as it does the beauties of rocky coast and wooded inland hill, will suggest a preference, until you have been to Chambercombe woods, and then you hesitate. When the sun is broiling in cloudless blue, the coolness of a wood, in which the sunbeams only flicker through branches, and elicit all their beauties, forms a pleasant retreat; and before you reach Chambercombe the eye has been delighted with perpetual landscapes. There is a lane feading into a farmyard-a Devonshire lane, remember-which will long hold a place in my memory. Close to the gate of this farmyard there is a spring which is a perfect miniature of some Swiss "falls." It spreads itself like a crystal fan on successive ledges of the hedge-bank, until it reaches a much broader ledge, where it forms a little lake on a bed of brown pebbles; then down it goes again till it reaches the road, where it runs along a tiny, happy, bubbling stream. One of the endless charms of these lanes-as of all mountainous districts-is the frequency of the springs, glossy with liverwort and feathery with fern, making a pleasant music day and night. Passing through the farmyard, where the pigs wallow, and grunt sensual satisfaction, and the cows look at you with bovine stupidity, you come upon a widening of the lane, where several gateways meet, and here the exquisite wildflowers, everywhere so abundant, seem more than ever luxuriant. What a perfect bit of foreground is that! A few rough mossy trunks lying against the tufts of fern, and a quiet donkey lying across the lane in "maiden meditation, fancy free;" it is one of those exquisite nothings which somehow affect you more than a fine landscape. At least it so affected us; and this was surpassed a little further on, when we came to a spot where a brook runs brawling across the lane, and a wooden bridge allows

those to pass who prefer not wetting their feet. A rough hurdle is fixed up where the brook gushes from the field into the lane, over brown stones, which it polishes into agate. Against the little bridge rises a tree, and all round its roots by the brook-side are varied tufts of fern and gems of wildflowers. How I wished to be a painter that I might sketch such bits as these, and not let enthusiasm evaporate in ohs! From this brook a step or two brought us to a shabby house, its broken windows rag-mended, and bearing the reputation of being haunted. I never saw the ghost; but I always saw a huge, divinely-awkward puppy, as happy and affectionate as puppies usually are. I could not get my companions to sympathise with me in my love for puppies in general, or in my wish to encourage the advances of this one in particular. De gustibus. There are people who don't like poetry; there are some indifferent to puppies. After a valedictory caress to this floppy acquaintance, we passed on into the woods, and while seated under delicious" umbrageosity," I soothed myself with a Latakia cigar, and contemplated a beautiful caterpillar spending its transitional life on a branch, happily knowing nothing of transitions. Pleasant was the murmurous sound of insects, pleasant the ripple of water, pleasant the glinting sunlight, and the broad reposing shade, but above all was the charm of interchanging thoughts. Yes, Nature is very lovely, and speaks to us in soothing tones; but Human Nature has a holier accent still.

Another favourite walk was to Watermouth and Berryn Narbor, over the edges of majestic cliffs, revealing inlet after inlet, each differing in its wealth of colour, each a picture, till we pass into what are called the "meadows," really a noble park, through which runs a stream fringed with wildflowers, and clear as crystal; every twenty or thirty yards the stream falls over an artificial precipice of stones, making a dulcet music. The slopes on each side are richly wooded; and the sequestered silence of this spot adds to its many charms. Who has not felt the deep peace which settles on the soul, when

a

lying in the long grass beside a stream, under a summer sun, no sound of traffic, contention, or of care to vex or sadden? Who has not sat upon a gate less to rest than to enjoy the peaceful idleness of noon, and looked upon the marvellous forms of life active around him, dreaming all the while of pleasant scenes, revisiting the memory, or of pleasant hopes rising, "like exhalations of the dawn.' In such a mood we one day rested on a gate under the trees beside this stream; presently a blind man felt his way also to the gate, and rested there. We spoke to him; he told us with that sluggish iteration characteristic of the countryman, that this was a fine healthy spot yes, a very healthy spot healthy spot. And he held down his head; alas! it was useless for him to hold it erect, fronting the lovely scene. Saddened by his presence, we soon moved on, and returning over the cliffs, we came upon another human being, with eyes closed to the beauty around, but closed in sleep, not blindness. A little girl, not more than eight years old, was stretched along the path, her rosy cheek resting on her little arm, which rested on the bare rock. How fast she was! but as Shakespeare says, "Weariness will snore upon a flint," and here was wearied innocence sleeping on a flint, the summer sun pouring down its rays upon her, and also on the milk, a can of which stood by her side whether the milk was as much benefited by this rest in the sun on its way to Ilfracombe, the consumers thereof must say. All I know is, that the picture was very touching, and I placed a penny in the child's halfclosed hand that she might find it on awaking. She would think some fairy had placed it there.

;

On reaching home there was dinner, to which two words had to be said, not contemptuous, believe me; and then coffee and cigar, with the serenities thereon attending; and then a stroll among my vases, for the inspection of my pets; and a stroll in the garden where I could inspect the pans under the verandah ; and then study; and then with limbs weary and eyes drooping, to bed :

So runs the round of life from hour
to hour.

time. Angry were the snarls, fierce were the scrambles, with which they knocked each other over, and squabbled for bone or crust. The courtesy on my part, however, so far had its reward, that I was able after a while to return at night from a party, without having close at my heels a barking pack, or being encompassed in a continually diminishing semicircle of fierce assailants, while my servant Cipriano, the drunken ruffian, kept me waiting at the door. They recognised, in spite of pumps and tights, the benefactor of the morning, and allowed me to pass in quiet to my quarters. Beyond this, however, there was no approach to mutual acquaintance. Not a dog of them ever once looked me in the face like the dog of social life. When I fed them, they watched my hand; but their eyes still glared, without sympathy, without intelligence.

This circumstance had the effect of piquing my curiosity. I was anxious to ascertain whether it was possible for a human biped to establish with these savages of the pavement the amicable relations, into which the civilised dogs I previously knew in England had always entered with such prompt cordiality. In fact, I wanted to see whether I could get one of these undomesticated, unkempt, half-wild, Peninsular dogs, who owned no human friend, to know me, to follow me, to recognise

me, to obey me as his lord and master, like the talented, affectionate, intelligent, thievish, villanous, dear old dog I had left in England, when with a lieutenant's commission, a light heart, and a thin pair of unmentionables, I sailed to join my regiment at Oporto. It seemed vain to try the experiment with a whole pack at once; but in the course of my Peninsular campaigning I had more than one opportunity with single dogs, and here follow the results.

My first experiment in domestication was on a Lisbon dog, who frequented the street of S. Pedro d'Alcantara, Buenos Ayres. In the campaign of 1812 I suffered, with the rest of the army, from exhaustion and fatigue, and at length received a wound in the leg which, though not

severe in itself, proved serious from my previous loss of strength. My general health became deranged; our regimental surgeon brought me before the board, and the board ordered me down on sick leave to Lisbon, where I took up my abode at an hotel in the said street of S. Pedro d'Alcantara. I was soon able to sit at the window, and make my observations on the various ragged and rough-hewn specimens of the canine race that with perpetual sniffs roamed on the pave beneath. Amongst these, my attention was ere long attracted to one miserable object, a puppy of some four or five months old, that looked as if it had grown from its birth without eating, and often shivered in the chill breeze of the coming winter. Yet the wretched whelp had evidently some stamina, as well as a marked individuality, and knew how to take his own part. I was often amused by the air of perfect equality with which he mingled among the other dogs his seniors. On all occasions he was ready to do battle, answered a snarl with a snap, and would wrangle for a bone with the biggest dog of the pack.

This was the extent of our first acquaintance. For, recovering health in the course of the winter, and bidding farewell to Lisbon and Lisbon dogs, I went up the country to rejoin my regiment. But I had started too soon; on returning to regimental duty my wound again became troublesome, and early in the spring I was compelled to revisit Lisbon, and resume my former quarters in the Rua de S. Pedro.

I found my friend the puppy grown to his full size, and in appearance much improved. He had come out in make something like a terrier, his colour a light tan; in his general aspect as presentable a dog as nine out of ten that you meet in London, but still with that wild glare of the eye which was common to his class. Although my landlord was a Portuguese, his wife was English; and perhaps it was due to a sentiment inherited on the maternal side that the children of the house, though born and bred in Lisbon, had noticed the puppy. They occasionally fed