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bound with a massive chain, lay bellowing, and vainly tightly embraced by the springing up of the arms, other endeavouring to tear from his throat the glittering pieces starting forwards and pinioning his legs, so that serpent which had coiled itself around him. A hissing he could not release himself until some one came to his dragon and savage-looking witch made tremendous assistance. Winstanley, in our own country, had ingrimaces at one another from out of little windows invented a precisely similar captivator. In the same the opposite sides of the cave; after which fearful performances, the chest closed itself up. The philosopher would then further amuse his visitors by a representation of Jonah swallowed up by the whale: this, we are informed, he succeeded in effecting by constructing a small figure of the prophet, having a magnet concealed in one leg, and putting a more powerful one in the interior of the figure of the great fish. Things were all ready for the swallowing up of the prophet, and he and the fish were sent to swim in a basin of water, and presently, before the eyes of the wondering visitors, poor Jonah would disappear in a twinkling down the fish's throat!

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palace was a statue of a satyr, which mimicked the human voice, and rolled its eyes and head in a manner very terrible to behold.' The museum of Settala at Milan was widely celebrated during the same epoch for divers kinds of marvel-exciting things, in which objects of natural history took an inferior rank to some of the ridiculous automatic ingenuities of the day. Before returning to our own country, let us spend a few moments with J. Baptist Porta, the follies of whom it were unjust to omit from a place in our catalogue. If ever man deserved the name of wizard, that man was Porta. His work on natural magic, well-known to most persons, is an extraordinary instance of the Kircher appears also to have laboured hard to com- prostitution of an acute and penetrating genius to the pass the realisation of the fable concerning the iron mere purpose of exciting popular wonder. He appears coffin of Mahomet; but in vain: he has, however, left to have been the inventor of the camera-obscura; at us a receipt for making a bird which should be sus- anyrate he made use of a device in which its prinpended in the air; but it is to be feared it is rather ciple was involved: he thus, by constructing figures of an exercise of his imagination than an actual possi- wood, &c. and placing them in a chamber strongly illubility. He certainly invented those curious toys now minated, filled the side of the apartment in which his sold by every philosophical instrument-maker, known friends were with spectres, battle-scenes, and hunting as the bottle imps,' consisting of a long glass cylinder representations; and he accompanied them, by collusive full of water, and having little figures of glass inside, agency, with all the life of a real scene: horns were which can be made to rise and fall by pressure upon heard, men and horses dashed across the field, the sun the bladder which covers the vessel. Among the other shone, the very clouds moved onwards, and the branches remarkables of his museum were little ships which set of the trees bent before the passing wind. Everything out from port, performed a miniature voyage, tacked, in Porta's house partook of a magical character. The and returned to harbour again; with divers other hy- drinking vessels were most mysterious: if a person draulic toys, motions, and mechanisms, in which the ventured to raise one of these dreadful glasses to his child-philosopher took a profound delight. Kircher, lips, suddenly a shower of the liquid would burst upon however, demands an expression of gratitude from every his face, and drench his clothes. Another wonderful one who in his boyhood has been intoxicated with the glass would yield its contents to the thirst of none mysterious charms of the magic lantern. It was invented but of him who knew the secret of its construction. by him about the middle of the seventeenth century, 'When his friends drank wine out of the same cup and became a formidable addition to the supernatural which he used, they were mortified with wonder; for capabilities of this already marvel-doing man. His he drank wine, and they only water! Or when, on a optical illusions were really of a high order; and there summer's day, all complained of the sirocco, he would may be reason to doubt whether some of them were freeze his guests with cold air in the room, or on a not used for a less legitimate purpose than the playful sudden let off a flying dragon, to sail along with a amusement of his friends. He contrived an apparatus cracker in its tail, and a cat tied on its back! so that for the production of aërial figures; and on one occasion it required strong nerves, in an age of apparitions and he represented the ascension of our Saviour, in a man- devils, to meet this great philosopher when in his best ner so life-like, as to strike all who beheld it with awe; humour.' In another apartment, an air-drawn dagger and they could not be dissuaded from the belief that it would seem to strike at one's heart; or one's limbs would was real, until they attempted to grasp the figure. An- be seen to be distorted, swollen, or contracted, or multiother of his marvels was to put his friends into a dark-plied. Moreover, Porta knew the secret of making a ened room, and suddenly to cast a blaze of light upon the wall, in the midst of which would be seen the mysterious word, 'Beware!'

man believe himself to be a bird-none other than a
goose!-and attempt to fly; or a fish, and attempt to
swim;
which was by dosing him with a certain medi-
cine. He could also make a man drunk or sober at
his pleasure. When these varied attainments are re-
flected on, it will not be surprising that his visitors
were almost exclusively his philosophic contemporaries,
whose moral courage was equal to the contemplation of
his supernaturalities.

Italy, the nurse of the fine arts, at that period teemed with similar collections of curiosities. The palaces of her nobility were incomplete without them. The villa of the Cardinal Aldobrandini was a second fairyland, possessing beauties natural, artistic, and magical, in no common degree. In a grotto in the garden the cardinal had constructed all manner of curious rocks, hy- Winstanley, the unfortunate architect of the Eddydraulic organs, and automatic birds: the birds sang and stone lighthouse, was Porta's representative in England. chirped, the organs discoursed most eloquent music, and In the admirable work of Smeaton upon that structhe rocks moved, and melted into fountains of water. ture, some particulars are mentioned which refer to the To these were added several other pageants and scenes, strange taste of his predecessor in the work for nickin which thunder and lightning, and wind and rain, were nackeries. Winstanley had a house at Littlebury in miraculously represented. In a word, one who visited Essex, which in many respects resembled that of Porta it with intense delight says, 'You could scarcely stir a in Italy. A slipper, lying carelessly on the floor, if step without being wetted through;' which was a very kicked aside, would suddenly give birth to a ghastly favourite practical joke of the seventeenth century. In phantom, which would start up to scare the intruder. one of the rooms of this villa was a copper ball, which His arm-chair was, if possible, even a more alarming was for ever suspended in the air, about a yard from piece of furniture. If you sat down,' writes Smeaton, the ground, to the great wonderment of the spectator.in a certain arbour by the side of a canal, you were Beneath it was a hole, through which rushed a strong blast of air, which buoyed up the copper ball upon its bosom. At the Borghese palace the visitor was shown a chair, in which he was politely requested to seat himself; and instantly upon doing so, he found himself

forthwith sent out afloat into the middle of the canal, from whence it was impossible to escape until the manager drew it back again.' It is stated that he subsequently formed a public exhibition at the west end of London of some curious water-works, mentioned in the

Tatler' for September 1709, the admission to which was one shilling. The exhibition appears to have consisted of curious jets d'eaux principally. Unhappily his talent for whimsicalities proved at length fatal to him, as there is no doubt that the fancifulness of the Eddystone lighthouse, built by him, was mainly conducive to its destruction.

Unfortunately, we can only give a few passages from this very remarkable speech.

The celebrated Sir Samuel Morland was another of the virtuosi of the same epoch. The Lord-Keeper Guilford once dined with this philosopher, and spent a pleasant day in the midst of all sorts of wonders. Sir Samuel was then resident at Vauxhall, and had been at a great expense in filling his house with ingenious contrivances. At the dinner in question, a large fountain was made to play in the room, and the drinking-glasses each stood under little streams of water. The windows, doors, hinges, and chimneys were all the contrivance of the philosopher, and were of course all of them out of the common way. His museum must have been worth looking at, for gossip Evelyn, who went to see every-ing of three rooms, ten feet long, lived Stephen Turner, thing, has a note, I went to see Sir Samuel Morland's inventions and machines, arithmetical wheels, quenchfires, and new harp.' A wonderful contrivance of his was his clock-work cooking apparatus, which, he says, with some dismay, cost him thirty pounds! It contained a fireplace and grate, and would broil a cutlet, or make a stew, or roast an egg to a nicety. He carried this surprising mechanism with him when he travelled; and at inns, we are informed, he was his own cook!

These examples may suffice for our purpose. Let it not be imagined that in the age in which these wonderraising things and men flourished, the marvels were regarded, as now, as mere efforts of philosophy in her playful moods: far from it. There is abundant evidence to show that they occupied a far too high and important station in the minds of philosophers. When, therefore, the daybreak advanced, they fell to the subordinate position, and assumed the more trivial character which properly appertains to them. This is the line, then, which is to be drawn between the follies of the wise' of that day, and the amusements of the wise since that time. To both, however, we owe much instructive and delightful recreation, and, in several instances, the first idea of implements and apparatus which are now applied to purposes the most useful and important.

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THE SLAVE SYSTEM OF ENGLAND. ENGLAND has, professedly, no slaves; but, as we lately attempted to show,* she has a system of slavery nevertheless, in consequence of some peculiarities in her arrangements regarding pauperism. A member of the humbler classes no sooner begins to exist, than he becomes a subject of very grave consideration to his superiors-where and upon whom is he to be chargeable on the failure of employment? Chargeability is the English slave system. The poor man cannot go where he lists in search of employment-he may become chargeable. He cannot take a good place which may be offered to him, for he cannot get a residence, lest he become chargeable. Houses are pulled down over the ears of honest working-men, and decent poor people are driven from Dan to Beersheba, lest they should become chargeable. There is something infinitely distressing in the whole basis of this idea-that an English peasant must needs be regarded from his first breath, and all through life, as a possible pauper. But the positive hardships arising from the idea are what we have at present to deal with.

These are delineated in a happy collection of facts, lately brought forward by Mr Chadwick at a meeting of the Farmers' Club in London. It appears that the company assembled, who, from their circumstances, were all qualified to judge of the truth of the facts and the soundness of the conclusions, gave a general assent to what was said by the learned Poor-Law secretary.

* Article, Serfdom,' No. 170.

Mr Chadwick first referred to the operation of the existing law upon unsettled labouring men. 'The lower districts of Reading were severely visited with fever during the last year, which called attention to the sanitary condition of the labouring population. I was requested to visit it. Whilst making inquiries upon the subject, I learned that some of the worst-conditioned places were occupied by agricultural labourers. Many of them, it appeared, walked four, six, seven, and even eight miles, in wet and snow, to and from their places of work, after twelve hours' work on the farm. Why, however, were agricultural labourers in these fever-nests of a town? I was informed, in answer, that they were driven in there by the pulling down of cottages, to avoid parochial settlements and contributions to their maintenance in the event of destitution. Amongst a group, taken as an example there, in a wretched place consista wife, and three children. He walked to and from his place of work about seven miles daily, expending two hours and a-half in walking before he got to his productive work on the farm. His wages are 10s. a-week, out of which he pays 2s. for his wretched tenement. If he were resident on the farm, the two and a-half hours of daily labour spent in walking might be expended in productive work; his labour would be worth, according to his own account, and I believe to a farmer's acknowledgment, 2s. 6d. per week more. For a rent of L.5, 5s., such as he now pays, he would be entitled to a good cottage with a garden; and his wife and children being near, would be available for the farm labour. So far as I could learn, there are between one hundred and two hundred agricultural labourers living in the borough of Reading, and the numbers are increasing. The last week brought to my notice a fact illustrative of the present unjust state of things, so far as regards the labourer. A man belonging to Maple-Durham lived in Reading; walked about four miles per day to his work, the same back, frequently getting wet; took fever, and continued ill some time, assisted by the Reading union in his illness; recovered, and could have returned to his former employment of 10s. per week, but found he was incapable of walking the distance; the consequence was, he took work that only enabled him to earn 5s. per week; he is now again unable to work. Even in Lincolnshire, where the agriculture is of a high order, and the wages of the labourer consequently not of the lowest, similar displacements have been made, to the prejudice of the farmer as well as the labourer, and, as will be seen, of the owner himself. Near Gainsborough, Lincoln, and Louth, the labourers walk even longer distances than near Reading. I am informed of instances where they walk as far as six miles; that is, twelve miles daily, or seventy-two miles weekly, to and from their places of work. Let us consider the bare economy, the mere waste of labour, and what a state of agricultural management is indicated by the fact that such a waste can have taken place. Fifteen miles a-day is the regular march of infantry soldiers, with two rest days -one on Monday, and one on Thursday; twenty-four miles is a forced march. The man who expends eight miles per diem, or forty-eight miles per week, expends to the value of at least two days' hard labour per week, or one hundred in the year, uselessly, that might be expended usefully and remuneratively in production. How different is it in manufactories, and in some of the mines, or at least in the best-managed and most successful of them! In some mines as much as L.2000 and L.3000 is paid for new machinery to benefit the labourers, and save them the labour of ascending and descending by ladders. In many manufactories they have hoists to raise them and their loads from lower to upper rooms, to save them the labour of toiling up stairs, to economise their strength for piece-work to mutual advantage. It is not in county and borough towns only that this unwholesome over-crowding is going on. I an informed

than half-crowners." The freedom of labour, not only in the northern counties, but in some places near the slave-labour districts of the southern counties, is already attended with higher wages-at the rate of 12s., 14s., and 15s. weekly. In such counties as Berks and Bedford, the freedom of the labour market, when it came into full operation, could not raise wages less than 2s. a-week; and 2s. a-week would, in those counties, represent a sum of productive expenditure and increased produce equal to the whole amount of unproductive expenditure on the poor-rates.'

It forcibly occurs to us, that of all the absurd social arrangements which still deform our civilisation, this of parochial settlement, attended as it is by such effects, is the most absurd. One can hardly believe that those who reared and now support such a system can be rational creatures. Strangest of all, while such horrible evils have been depressing the rural peasantry, the talkers and writers of our age have been looking in a totally different quarter for objects of philanthropic enthusiasm. The manufacturing operatives, who have twice the wages, with hoists to save them even the labour of going up and down stairs, have been the themes of bitter deploration, as if their condition were a foul plague-spot upon the country, while the peasantry have been supposed to exemplify something like the golden age, or the peace and comfort of Arcadia. Only now are facts beginning to dispel this monstrous delusion.

STRAY NOTES IN ZOOLOGY.

that from the like cause the evil of over-crowding is going on in the ill-conditioned villages of open parishes. It is admitted, and made manifest in extensive evidence given before a committee of the House of Lords by practical farmers, that when an agricultural labourer applies for work, the first question put to him is not what has been his experience, what can he do, but to what parish does he belong. If he do not belong to the parish of the occupier, the reply is usually an expression of regret that he can only employ the labourer of his own parish. To the extent to which the farmer is directly liable to the payment of rates, by the displacement of a settled parish labourer, he is liable to a penalty for the employment of any other labourer who is not of the parish. To the same extent is he liable to a penalty if he do not employ a parish labourer who is worthless, though a superior labourer may be got by going further a-field, to whom he would give better wages. This labourer who would go further is thus driven back upon his parish; that is to say, imposed, and at the same time made dependent upon, the two or three, or several farmers, by whom the parish is occupied. He then says, "If this or that farmer will not employ me, one of them must; if none of them will, the parish must keep me, and the parish pay is as good as any." Labour well or ill, he will commonly get little more, and it is a matter of indifference to him: it is found to be, in all its essential conditions, labour without hope-slave labour; and he is rendered unworthy of his hire. On the other hand, in what condition does the law place the employer? It imposes upon him the whole mass of labourers of a narrow district, of whatsoever sort, without reference to his wants or his capital. He says, "I do not want the THE following anecdote, told by Mr Featherstonhaugh in men at this time, or these men are not suitable to me; his Canoe Voyage up the Minnay Sotor,' places the pig at they will not do the work I want; but if I must have a respectable elevation in the scale of discriminating intelthem, or pay for keeping them in idleness if I do not ligence: As we approached a farm on the American side employ them, why, then, I can only give them such of the St Clair river, belonging to the captain of our wages as their labour is worth to me, and that is little." steamer, a curious fact fell under my observation. The Hence wages are inevitably reduced. What must be the pigs belonging to the farm came squealing down to the effect upon the manufacturer if he were placed in the water-side, a thing which the persons at the farm assured same position as tenant farmers are in the smaller pa-tain explained this singular recognition on the part of the me they never did when other steamers passed. The caprishes in the southern counties, if he were restricted to pigs, by stating that the swill of his steamer was always the employment only of the labourers in the parish? If, preserved for them, and that, on reaching the landing-place, before he engaged a smith, a carpenter, or a mason, he it was immediately put on shore to feed them. The aniwere compelled to inquire, "To what parish do you mals having been accustomed to this valuable importation belong?" Why, that the 24s. a-week labour would during the whole summer months, had learned to disfall to 12s. or 10s., or the price of agricultural labour. tinguish the peculiar sound which the steam made in rushAgriculturists from northern districts, who work their ing through the pipe of the steamer; and as they could do farms with 12s. and 15s. a-week free labour, have de- this at the distance of half a mile, they immediately, upon clined the temptation of low rents, to take farms in hearing it, hastened down to the river, whilst the noise parishes where the wages are 7s. or 8s. a-week. Whilst made by the other steamers was disregarded.' This is a inspecting a farm in one of these pauperised districts, ties of the lower animals by an appeal to their appetites, curious instance of the possibility of sharpening the faculan able agriculturist could not help noticing the slow and a conclusive proof that the readiest way to make all drawling motions of one of the labourers there, and said, swinish animals reasonable, is to provide plenty of swill for "My man, you do not sweat at that work." "Why, them. no, master," was the reply; "seven shillings a-week isn't sweating wages." The evidence I have cited indicates the circumstances which prevent the adoption of piece work, and which, moreover, restrict the introduction of machinery into agricultural operations, which, strange though it may appear to many, is greatly to the injury of the working-classes; for wherever agricultural labour is free, and machinery has been introduced, there more and higher-paid labour is required, and labourers are enabled to go on and earn good wages by work with machines long after their strength has failed them for working by hand. In free districts, and with high cultivation by free and skilled labour, I can adduce instances of skilled agricultural labourers paid as highly as artisans. I could adduce an instance, bordering upon Essex, where the owner, working it with common parish labour at 1s. 6d. a-day, could not make it pay; and an able farmer now works it with free labour at 2s. 6d., 3s., and 3s. 6d., and even more, per day, for task-work, and, there is reason to believe, makes it pay well. A farmer, who died not long ago immensely wealthy, was wont to say that "he could not live upon poor 2s. a-day labour; he could not make his money upon less

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Every one is aware of the ferocious contests which often take place among the higher animals during the season of love and gallantry; but few, we believe, will be prepared to find the same feeling raging as fiercely among the cold-blooded denizens of the waters, though the poet has long ago given his word for it, that even an oyster may be crossed in love.' Such, however, is the case, if we may credit the subjoined paragraph from the Elgin Courier: While several cutter-men (of the Preventive Service) were on their rounds the other day, and bearing along the Findhorn, between Glenferness and Dulcie Bridge, they observed an unusual commotion among the spawning beds of the ford. On approaching the spot, two large male salmon were seen engaged in mortal combat for the possession of a female. Never did chivalric knights contest for the hand of "ladye fair" more fiercely than those buirdly lords of the flood. The tranquil bosom of the stream was lashed into foam by the struggles of fray was beating silently about, "spectatress of the fight." the finny antagonists; in the meantime the object of the From the appearance of the stream-dyed with blood, and gradually assuming its former smooth surface-it was evident that the contest was over. One of the salmon at last flounders on the surface-dead; and the victor, it may be conjectured, exhaustedly bore off his prize. The men,

who had the curiosity to watch the fight, as a proof of their story, conveyed the dead salmon to the nearest dwelling. The victor had torn off the flesh along the back, from head to tail, to the very hone. In the movement of salmon-spawning, the males have often been seen chasing each other; but such a fray as this has not been witnessed by the oldest fisher or poacher on the Findhorn.'

Mr Gardner, in his recently-published 'Travels in Brazil,' furnishes some additional information respecting the habits and character of the electric eel:-'In the Rio de Palma,' says he, as in all the rivers within the province of Goyaz, the Gymnotus electricus is exceedingly common. They are of all sizes, from a foot to six feet in length, and are frequently caught on the lines which are set for fishes; they are sometimes eaten, but not generally, although their flesh is said to be very good. Horses as well as men, by coming in contact with them in the water, are not unfrequently thrown down by the shock which they impart; they are called by the inhabitants Treme-treme. In rainy weather, those who fish in these rivers often receive a shock, which is communicated along the moisture upon the rod and line when one of them happens to seize the hook. I saw one in a state of captivity, about six feet long, which was so tame, that it would allow any one to put his hand upon it, and even slide for its whole length through the fingers; but if irritated in the smallest degree, by pinching it a little, it instantly communicated a smart shock.'

The same authority confirms the early accounts respecting the size and prodigious swallowing capacity of the boaconstrictor-accounts which certain naturalists, whose researches never extended beyond the galleries of a museum, are in the habit of treating with ridicule and unbelief. "The boa,' says he, 'is not uncommon throughout the whole province of Goyaz, particularly by the wooded margins of lakes, marshes, and streams. Sometimes they attain the enormous length of forty feet: the largest I ever saw was at this place, but it was not alive. Some weeks before our arrival at Sapé, the favourite riding-horse of Senhor Lagoeira, which had been put out to pasture not far from the house, could not be found, although strict search was made for it all over the fazienda. Shortly after this, one of his vaqueiros, in going through a wood by the side of a small river, saw an enormous boa suspended in the fork of a tree which hung over the water: it was dead, but had evidently been floated down alive by a recent flood; and being in an inert state, it had not been able to extricate itself from the fork before the waters fell. It was dragged out to the open country by two horses, and was found to measure thirty-seven feet in length. On opening it, the bones of a horse, in a somewhat broken condition, and the flesh in a half-digested state, were found within it, the bones of the head being uninjured. From these circumstances, it was concluded that the boa had devoured the horse entire. In all kinds of snakes the capacity for swallowing is prodigious. I have often seen one not thicker than my thumb swallow a frog as large as my fist; and I once killed a rattlesnake, about four feet long, and of no great thickness, which had swallowed not less than three large frogs, one of which swelled out its sides to nearly twice the thickness of the other parts. I have also seen a very slender snake that frequents the roofs of houses, swallow an entire bat three times its own thickness. If such be the case with these smaller kinds, it is not to be wondered at that one thirty-seven feet long should be able to swallow a horse, particularly when it is known that, previously to doing so, it breaks the bones of the animal by coiling itself round it, and afterwards lubricates it with a slimy matter which it has the power of secreting in its mouth.'

Much has been said and written both for and against the ingenuity and imitative faculties of monkeys-these accounts, however, generally referring to the animals in a state of domestication and training. We have little recorded of their natural state beyond their chattering frolicsomeness, their shyness, their affection for their young, or their occasionally pelting some obtrusive traveller with rotten twigs or palm-nuts from the branches overhead. The following extract from the same traveller not only adds to our knowledge on this score, but exhibits the monkey tribe as capable of employing implements, if we may so speak, for the attainment of a certain end:-The moist and marshy campos produce various kinds of palm-trees, which bear large clusters of small nuts, greatly resembling miniature cocoa-nuts. When ripe, these are covered exterually with a fibrous oily substance, which has a sweetish

taste, and constitutes the favourite food of the little ringtailed monkeys, which are no less fond of the internal part of the nut, which contains a kernel similar to that of the cocoa. In several parts of the interior, I had been told that, to get at this kernel, the shell being too hard to break with their teeth, the monkeys carry the nuts to a rocky place, and there break them with a stone; and I even met with persons who assured me that they had watched them in such places, and actually seen them engaged in this ope ration. This account I always considered to be fabulous till I arrived at Sapé. In an excursion we made over the Serra, where it is composed of nearly bare, rugged limestone peaks, in several almost inaccessible places, we came upon large heaps of the broken shells of nuts, generally on a bare open part of the rock, and along with them a number of roundish pieces of stone, larger than the fist, which had evidently been employed in breaking the shells. These, Senhor Lagoeira told me, were the places resorted to by the monkeys for the purpose of breaking the nuts collected in the low grounds; and that, in his shooting excursions over the mountains, he has frequently seen them take flight on his approach. That they both can, and really do, make use of a stone in order to break that which is too hard for their teeth, I have frequently witnessed in a little pet monkey that accompanied me on my journey. I obtained it in Piauhy, and it was the only one of the many tame animals I carried with me that reached Rio de Janeiro alive it was a female of the species we are now speaking of, and ultimately became very gentle. Jerry was the fa vourite with all, and indeed in all respects fared like ourselves: it became so fond of tea, which it drank every morning and evening, that it would not go to sleep without its usual allowance. Its favourite food was farinha, boiled rice, and bananas; but scarcely anything came amiss to it. A raw egg was a choice morsel, and on being given to it, it broke one end by gently knocking it on the floor, and completed the hole by picking off the broken bits of shell, and putting in the point of its long slender finger; throwing back its head, and holding the egg erect between its two hands, it soon contrived to suck out the whole contents. Whenever anything was given to it that was too hard to break with its teeth, it always looked about for a stone, which it would hold in both its hands, and rising erect on its legs, would let it fall, leaping backwards at the same time, to avoid any injury to its toes.'

Wits and essayists are in the habit of setting up the penguin as their standard of awkwardness and stupid indifference: how far they are justifiable in doing so, let the reader of the following extract from Dr Von Tschudi's 'Travels in Peru' determine :- A species of penguin, called by the Peruvians Pararo Nino, or the Child Bird, is easily tamed, becomes very social, and follows its master like a dog. It is amusing to see it waddling along with its plump body and short legs, and keeping itself in equilibrium by moving its floating wings. I had one completely tame, which I bought from an Indian. It was named Pope, and readily answered to the name. When I was at my meals, he regularly placed himself beside my chair, and at night he slept under my bed. When he wished to bathe, he went into the kitchen, and beat with his bill on an earthen pan until somebody threw water over him, or brought him a vessel full of water for a bath.'

We are occasionally assailed by the anonymous abuse of parlour naturalists for repeating what certain travellers have written respecting the dimensions and habits of the socalled bird-catching spiders of South America: what do such authorities say to the recent testimony of Dr Von Tschudi? At Quibe,' he says, 'I saw a bird-catching spider (mygale) of extraordinary large size. The back-part of the body alone measured two inches! Being at some distance, I supposed it to be one of the rodent animals, and I fired at it. To my mortification I discovered my mistake when too late, for the specimen was completely destroyed by the shot, and was useless for my collection. The Indians assured me that on the margin of the stream which flowed near the plantation, many larger individuals were to be found; but I never saw another of such remarkable size as the one I inadvertently destroyed.'

The vampire, or blood-sucking bats, which were also so long regarded as fabulous, are thus spoken of by the same recent authority:-'Not less troublesome are the leaf-nosed bats (phyllostoma), which attack both man and beast. This bat rubs up the skin of his victim, from which he sucks the blood. The domestic animals suffer greatly from the nocturnal attacks of these creatures, and many are destroyed

the ministers of commerce and finance; but the legislature would not comply, to the lively satisfaction of the country graziers, and the great displeasure of the con

sumers,

The butchers for a long time fostered a race of gigantic dogs, which, harnessed to little carts, dragged the meat from the abattoirs to the shops. Since this species of equipage has been proscribed, they have substituted serviceable steeds, and hence we find so many butchers among the cavalry of the National Guard. Their guard days are days of feasting and indulgence. After an ample breakfast, they pass the day in drinking punch, in gambling, and in noisy conversation, consist

by the exhaustion consequent on the repeated blood sucking. The blood drawn by the bat itself does not exceed a few ounces; but if, when satisfied, it drops down to the ground, or flies away, the wound continues to bleed for a long time, and in the morning the animal is often found in a very weak condition, and covered with blood. One of my mules, on which a leaf-nosed bat made a nightly attack, was only saved by having his back rubbed with an ointment made of spirits of camphor, soap, and petroleum. The blood-suckers have such an aversion to the smell of this ointment, that on its application they ceased to approach the mule. These bats are very mischievous in the plantations of the forests, where beasts of burden and horned cattle are exposed to their attacks. Whether they venture to assail man, has been a much-disputed question. Seve-ing of little else than the terms of the game they play. ral travellers declare they do not. I may, however, mention a case which occurred within my own knowledge. A bat fastened on the nose of an Indian lying intoxicated in a plantation, and sucked so much blood, that it was unable to fly away. The slight wound was followed by such severe inflammation and swelling, that the features of the Cholo were not recognisable.' This account is confirmed by Mr Gardner, the Brazilian traveller, who believes that the puncture which the vampire makes in the skin of the animals is effected by the sharp-hooked nail of its thumb, and that from the wound thus made it abstracts the blood by the suctorial powers of its lips and tongue.

THE BUTCHERS OF PARIS. PREVIOUS to the Revolution, the butchers of Paris were subjected to a number of vexatious rules, which have since been considerably modified. A great improvement was effected in 1810. By a decree of Napoleon in that year, all private slaughter-houses were abolished, and in their stead five public abattoirs, under strict regulations, were established: and thus, thirty-seven years ago, Bonaparte effected for Paris what till this day our legislature has not had the intelligence or the fortitude to accomplish for London or any other city.

One fine day, in the summer of 1824, a butcher returning from Poissy in his cart observed before him one of the court carriages, containing her Royal Highness the Duchess de Berry. He was a liberal, no very zealous partisan of the royal family, and thought it would be a glorious thing to outrun, with his good dapple-gray, the six horses of the princely equipage. He starts at a gallop, distances her highness, suffers her to resume the advantage, commences a new contest, and is again the victor; and repeats this exploit many times with the same success. The next day, the duchess having sent to him with a polite demand to inquire whether he would sell his horse, he replied with haughtiness, 'I can feed my horses as well as madame: my circumstances allow it. This could be considered only a piece of gratuitous insolence, for no doubt the duchess reasonably concluded that the man had been showing off his horse in the hope of disposing of it to her. The truth is, the Parisian butchers are a coarse, unmannerly set of people, the descendants of a generally cruel and reckless portion of the community. The stallmen and shopkeeping butchers are usually superior, in point of polish, to the slaughtermen; still, even of them not much good can be said.

On the Thursday which precedes Jeudi gras, or fat Thursday, oxen of colossal size are led to the market of Poissy; and the fattest, ornamented with streamers, exposed for sale in the middle of the market-place, is soon surrounded by a circle of bidders, who dispute the honour of his possession. It is not the desire of gain which animates them; it is rather the love of glory, the ambition of being mentioned in the journals, the honour of sending a sirloin to the king of the French, and of occupying, though but for a day, the first rank among their colleagues. The biddings go on with spirit and eagerness, and mount up with reckless extravagance and rapidity: the victory hangs for a moment undecided, and the fear of ruin barely restrains the eager candidates.

To the emperor also is owing the institution of a general market for the sale of meat; but it is not much prized, and the more respectable butchers keep shops throughout the city and environs. The number of Parisian butchers is limited to five hundred. There were but three hundred and ten in 1822. Thirty of the whole number, designated by the prefect of police, and of whom ten are selected from the least influential of their class, nominate a syndic and six associates. The syndic, two associates, and one-third of the electors, are renewed annually by lot. A butcher cannot establish himself at Paris without the permission of the prefect of police, granted by the advice of the syndics and associates; and a guarantee of three thousand francs is moreover required from a candidate. Numerous ordinances of police regulate the relations of the The victor consigns his purchase to the abattoir, butchers with the public, prevent the sale of unwhole-whence the animal starts in procession precisely at nine some meat, and prescribe the measures to be taken for o'clock on the morning of the following Sunday. A the proper management of the market stalls. document headed L'Ordre et la Marche du Bœuf gras,' circulated through Paris, has aroused the population of the city, which is everywhere concentrated upon the route of the monstrous beast.

The traffic in beasts for the provisioning of Paris can only take place at the markets of Sceaux and Poissy, the Marché aux Vaches Grasses, and the Halle aux Veaux. The Bank of Poissy, instituted in 1811, pays ready money to the drovers and country cattle merchants for all the purchases made. It is under the surveillance of the prefect of the Seine, and its funds are composed of the guarantee deposits made by the butchers, and sums accruing from an open credit account managed by the said prefect.

Many of the more wealthy butchers are addicted to the unlawful commerce called vente à la cheville (literally, sale by the piece). They purchase entire animals, and sell the meat in detail to their less fortunate colleagues. As this species of traffic is considered to be injurious to the levying of duties at the barriers on live animals which enter the city, it is made illegal, and therefore many poor families suffer. A general council of the department of the Seine prayed for a relaxation of the protective duties in 1838 and 1839. A petition of the butchers to the same effect was forwarded in 1840 to

A troop of drummers and musicians, and the butcher proprietor of the beast, head the procession; the latter mounted on the best horse he can procure. These are followed by a party of the municipal guard, and then come files of butchers' workmen on horseback, and masked, knights with paper helmets, Turks glittering with spangles, firemen with glazed hats, mock military, charcoal-men, lightermen; in a word, all the odd and grotesque figures of the city. In the midst of the cavalcade walks the huge ox, in full dress, escorted by a swarm of savages in tight flesh-coloured suits, brandishing enormous clubs of coloured paper, with monstrous sham beards, and their heads bristling with feathers, such as travellers and poets depict the human biped in his unsophisticated state. Behind comes an ornamental car of wood and canvas, conducted by old Time, and containing Venus, Mercury, Hercules, and a little curlyheaded boy, who takes the title of Love. This brilliant

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