sing in confinement an hour or two after sunset. The mode adopted for quieting this bird, when first caged, (and if taken after he has been mated he will surely die,) is to place himpreviously tying the tips of his wings-in a cage, the top, sides, and back of which are made of wood; paste over the front a covering of tissue-paper, and feed the bird from a trough, or pan, placed on a level with the sand-drawer; also, the drinking-vessel to be so arranged as not to require to open the cage-door; feed the bird from the bottom, not looking at him, at the same hour daily. After the third day, he will go down at once to feed, and the paper may be torn away by degrees, by which time he will have become tame.

With reference to food, I furnish the formula found to be most successful, premising that the best is far removed from nature; and this observation holds good with regard to all artificial preparations for birds that are not granivorous. Press the yolk of a hard-boiled egg once through an iron sieve, pour on it a few drops of water, sufficient to form a paste, scrape an equal quantity of juicy raw beef, and mix all together; the consistence should not be heavy, or the bird will not feed freely, nor too light, or it will cause weakness. If your bird is not fat, the water may be omitted. In autumn, they fatten much, and should be given mealworms and spiders three times a week; when the swollen appearance declines, keep the bird warm; likewise, if inclined to leanness, give figs, chopped finely, and mixed with the ordinary food, but discontinue them when not needed.

The great difficulty in treating of food arises from the evils of confinement, causing indigestion to this bird especially. Those so fed I have heard sing gloriously, have moulted well, and at this writing have a plumage smooth as marble; one especially shows a bold front, advances towards his kind master, and distinguishes him, gazing at strangers with a shy aspect. It is a scandal to impugn the appearance of the nightingale: his dress is of sober brown; his shape elegant; his gait is proud and graceful; his eyes are full of inquiry and intelligence, not observable to careless persons, but in accordance with the true harmony of nature; his grave aspect protects him; with a bright coat, and throat of the most perfect music -what chance would he have? In confinement, his appearance varies with the care he may enjoy; smoky, close rooms will darken his plumage, and improper food destroy hist elastic gait.

There is another kind of food sometimes

adopted-German paste, and parboiled sheep's heart-the latter free from fat. It is my opinion, that the ingredients composing the paste are too rich for a bird so delicate as the present subject. Some birds (branchers, so called from the time they leave their nests until they migrate in autumn) are brought to thrive on this strong food; but it is doubtful if they are longlived. The first-named food should be given fresh, twice a day-in summer, morning and mid-day, or the meat will have become tainted, and injure the feeder. Ants-their eggs-and ants' mould are desirable; mealworms allowed occasionally, principally when, as is frequently the case, their appetites fail, at the migratory season; as an article of daily food, they are hurtful, producing restlessness, and distaste for other food. The greatest cleanliness to be observed in scalding the feeding-vessels and scouring the sand-drawer; and the cages to be so constructed as not to require to disturb them from the wall during the process.

In summer, the drinking vessels should be renewed twice, daily; in winter, every day, and, if possible, the amateur should perform these attentions at a regular hour, noticing his captive all the time, who will become familiar or sulky, according to the modicum of attention proffered; not that the nightingale will permit the familiarities that a seed-eating bird would meet half-way, his dignity would be at fault.

The skin of this bird being porous and very tender, care must be taken with reference to bathing. In winter, he should not be allowed a greater supply of water than the drinkingvessel contains, and at no time should he be allowed to bathe if the temperature be below 70°, and the sun not shining; it is perhaps best on all occasions to take the chill off the water; an ardent desire common to migrants to wash himself will cause this bird to wash, and soak, and shiver, day after day, till he dies; paralysis is a frequent consequence of winter bathing to many of this species.

The nightingale is subject to loss of sight if the room is kept below temperate, a moderate heat is best suited to their constitution; many mistaken opinions have induced the adoption of a high artificial temperature, which has proved fatal. During moult, their digestion is temporarily impaired, give additional ants, ants' eggs, and mealworms, also a spider, and some iron or saffron water; if melancholy, dissolve sugar candy in the drinking vessel, and provide suitable food-this care will cheer and keep him healthy-of insects, these birds eat all but the hairy caterpillar; the young larvæ

in the combs of wasps and hornets, is his favorite food.*

Like the black-cap, robin, and thrush species, the nightingale feeds on juicy berries, especially towards the autumnal migratory season. This is but little noted by amateurs; by a trifling degree of trouble they might be preserved in summer, by drying the berries and fruits in the sun that have been previously threaded with a needle; in cold weather, dip them daily in tepid water, when they will swell, recover a portion of their colour, and be taken with avidity by your bird. The coleopterous insects may be also preserved; mealworms can be purchased, or "raised," by the possessor of soft-billed birds. A clever writer made this pithy observation, that the nightingale, not being an egg-sucker, the provision of an hard-boiled egg is unnatural as staple food.

The scales must be removed once a year from the feet of the nightingale; for gout, use fresh butter; for cramps, hartshorn and oil.

Owing to carelessness in feeding, fibrous matter from meat will sometimes collect round the tongue, causing the appearance of choking, in such case, open the beak very gently with a flat stick, and remove the obstruction.

I have now given the fullest instruction for the treatment of this favourite songster, and conclude by advising no one to keep nightingales who has not sedentary occupations, with spare time and patience.

Abler pens than mine have vainly tried to describe the preparation of the nightingale for the hymn of nature-the soft breathings of love and joy-the strains poured forth amidst

the solemn quiet of evening, and in welcoming in the approaching morn,

"Where silence yields

To the night-warbling bird, that now awake,
Tunes sweetest his love-labor'd song."

Izaak Walton's eulogy runs thus:-" The nightingale breathes such sweet music out of hert little instrumental throat, that it might make mankind to think that miracles had not ceased. He, that at midnight, when the very labourer sleeps securely, should hear, as I have very often, the clear airs, the sweet descants, the natural rising and falling, the doubling and redoubling of her voice, might well be lifted above earth, and say, 'Lord, what music hast thou provided for the saints in heaven, when thou afforded to bad man such music on earth!'"

Some idea of the superiority of this songster will be afforded, when it is related that the Hon. Daines Barrington, in his table of the comparative merits of birds, with regard to their notes-twenty being the point of perfection-states the nightingale's to be nineteen in mellowness, nineteen in plaintiveness, nineteen in compass, nineteen in duration, and fourteen in sprightliness.

The Encyclopædia Britannica pronounces this bird to sing but ten weeks in the year in a wild state, and ten months in captivity; the error is evident, were it confirmed, the voices of birds would arise more from sorrow than from joy; authority and experience demonstrate that he sings from the time he is mated until | the period when the young are hatched, his note then changes to a low hoarse note, expressive of anxiety: soon afterwards he departs. |

[We extract this article from our able contemporary of New York-The Literary World. It occurs in the course of a series entitled Home Sketches, and is from the pen of the author of The Yemassee. We so rarely meet a fairy tale of the New World, that our readers will, we are sure, thank us for transferring this to our pages.]

"THE car stops! what can be the matter? There is a screw loose somewhere."

It is a great error to feed nightingales on flies, they disorganize the digestion of this bird; the consequences have been so suddenly fatal as to induce the supposition that the insects had partaken of poison. The sole remedy is to strew the sanddrawer with ant-mould and ants, scatter a little

Sure enough, there was a screw loose; and, our engineer, with his assistants, was soon busy hammering and tinkering at the wheels of the iron horse. The delay threatened to be a serious one; and the passengers were soon to be seen, white and black, tumbling out in all directions. Our party of four followed the general example, and strolled off to a little hillock, freshly strewn with the decaying German paste on the surface of his food as usual (which he will shun), and continue the ants until he quite recovers.

+It is here observable that our quaint old fa vourite adopts the feminine gender. The female sings sweetly, but not so powerfully as to attract.

leaves of the forest, where we cast ourselves down, waiting events. The woods were still clothed in a most glorious garniture. The trees immediately about us were scrubby oaks, each of which was caparisoned like a young prince in crimson, waiting to be crowned. In the back-ground rose up a pine thicket, solemnly dark in its uniform depth of green. We mused for awhile, and at length naturally resumed the subjects of previous conversation.

"Woods and forests seem to be proper places to be haunted," was the remark of one of our companions. "But the spirits, or elves, or fairies, change their character according to the degree of civilization in a country. The English fairies were tricky and playful spirits, full of mischievous fun and fancy, but not malignant. The German elves were demons; and the Brownies of Scotland were scarcely less soquite as rough, certainly, if less frightful and diabolical. The forest and wild are possessed by demons; the woods by fairies. This seems to be the difference."

"Necessarily; and yet, such as are recognised (were rather) by our early back-woodsmen, do not seem to have been particularly hostile or malicious. From all that I have heard, they belong to the Puck and Robin Goodfellow order of spirits, and are never spiteful, unless when neglected or ill-treated. Our Aborigines, it is true, tell us of darker and sterner beings, who occupied with them the forests. Of these they had greater terrors, and generally converted them into deities, whose wrath they deprecated by worship and sacrifices. The wilder kind of elves whom they knew, they adopted into the family, as it were, making them lares familiares, and naturally seeming to expect from them a sort of domestic service. These could be mischievous, like those of the English, and they sometimes ran away with the venison, and so charmed the bows and arrows, as to defeat for a time, and until the hunter made atonement for his neglect or his offences, his skill and enterprise. There is undoubtedly a strong family likeness running through the elves and demons of all nations, which shows the secret conviction of the soul, making its superstitions to have been derived, in all regions, from the same universal fountains of imagination and thought. The most curious feature in this history is, that a nation succeeds to the phantoms of the people whom it supersedes, even as the Hebrews and other races; the Romans, for example, occasionally borrowed their gods from their neighbours. Among the early settlers of the American forests, there was a clear belief that, though

they dispossessed the Indians, their Di Lares still remained in frequent cases in the old settlement, town, or hunting range, and were to be seen and felt upon occasion. They seemed to belong to the soil rather than the people; and a change in the tribe or nation, so long as the habits of the people remained the same, worked no change in their auspices. This, I suspect, was the true reason why they lingered behind the race by whom they were first recognised. Their offices and influences were the same, and equally essential, so long as there was no decided alteration in the character and civilization of the human family. Now, during the first thirty years after the English colonization of this region, the greater number of the settlers were a wild, rude, uneducated people, whose acquisitions as well as habits were of a sort to make them particularly accessible to superstitious influences. I need not tell you that, where there is no faith, there are no spectres; we lose our capacity to perceive the supernatural, in due degree, as common reason opens to us, and satisfies us with the natural. But our early colonists had made few advances, and were nearly as rude, in most respects, as the Indians. They became hunters and graziers, and found themselves under the same influences through which the Indian had been made sensible of the spiritual in his forests. They also became acquainted, through tradition, with the elves and deities of the red man. These revived and strengthened the early superstitions of the European races, from which they sprang; and, in the lone depths of the forest, with the crash of winds among the trees, and the deep sighing of the midnight breeze, spectral images became necessary to supply the solitude with associations. The heart rather encourages such indications under such influences. Poverty and toil, in particular, perpetually crave a supernatural sympathy, as a substitute for that which wealth and society deny. Accordingly, the hermit, hunter, farmer, or grazier, remote from the world, in solemn, silent depths of the forest, becomes singularly susceptible of all the changes of the seasons, of the atmosphere, stars, and suns, and, through these, finds his sensibilities continually awakening to other and more occult influences. It is easy to find elves where we desire them. Our early peasantry had their familiars of the forest, with whom, in some cases, they lived on terms of singular intimacy. Ordinarily, what they knew of them was singularly vague and uncertain. They were conscious of strange noises, night and day, about them in the woods, particularly on the edges of the swamp

and thicket; and sometimes they heard sounds of inscrutable character about the dwelling; occasionally, glimpses were had of strange forms flitting suddenly from sight; and occasionally, at dusk, the clown was startled by the rude outlines of a form--which could not be considered human, but which was too closely akin to it not to command human respect and sympathy-which rose up suddenly beside the path. Pursued, a strangely-distorted stump. stood in place of the spectre. On one occasion, a woodman, thus startled and disappointed in this manner, is said to have struck the hatchet into the stump, and to have been terrified at an awful yell of pain and fury which instantly followed the blow. He took to his heels, and when, next day, he returned to the spot, he found no stump at all, but the earth was damp all around it, and the place was quickly covered with mushrooms. The story further relates, that the same woodman, using his axe upon a log, but a short time after, by some strange eccentricity of aim, struck off his left hand-a mishap only to be ascribed to the revengeful elf whom he had so wantonly smitten in the shape of a stump. The people seldom spoke freely in relation to these mysterious beings; they had an opinion that they did not like to be made subjects of conversation or scrutiny. They would show themselves to, and actually serve, the individual to whom they took a liking; haunting a particular household, and doing little offices where they were well treated. It was found, too, that they relished some varieties of human food, vegetable mostly, and were particularly fond of fruits. They ate Indian corn and peas, such as the Indians planted; but were better pleased with sweet potatoes and ground nuts (pindars or ground peas) of these latter they made great havoc, whenever they got a chance. A peck of them has disappeared in a night, nothing but the hulls (shells) remaining in proof of their dexterity and appetite. Of course, the housekeeper knew not whom to suspect; but they gave the quid for all that they got. They rendered useful services. They accumulated piles of wood for the fireplace when nobody saw; they drew water, and kept the bucket always full; and sometimes, when bear or wolf came about the habitation, they led the dogs out on the hunt at midnight. Bear and deer were said to have been found in the morning, with the hounds gorged, standing over them; the wounds upon the bear resembling those struck by a hatchet. As they were well treated by a family, their intimacy increased, and they have been occasionally known to sleep upon the

:

threshold, of a night, looking for all the world like the stump of a pine sapling cased in bark, and wrapped up in moss and leaves. Shape they seemed to have none; a crude, unsightly mass, with short bodies, long arms, big heads, red complexions, and small eyes. They could laugh-a sort of yell and chuckle, hoarse, but shrill, and delivered spasmodically. But the glimpses had of them were always so brief as to baffle close observation. With faculties differing from those of the white man, and apparently inferior, (as they seemed in some degree dependent upon his favours,) they had yet a corresponding capacity to do him service, and to render him help in situations where he could do little for himself. The Indians in all the tribes knew this particular sort of household or domestic fairy, and valued his attentions properly. In some of the southern nations, he went by the name of Logoochie. What the word signifies, we have never been able to ascertain."

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"A curious history, but nothing is seen of these beings now;-I mean, nobody now professes to assert or credit their existence?"

"Of that I cannot say! We hear nothing now-a-days, at least, and the region has undergone too great a change not to make us apprehend that our Indian elves are tolerated no longer. They have probably followed the tribes; or, if they linger still, are undiscernable in any way by the small faith of those who occupy the country. There are superstitions now, but of a different character. I fancy the revolutionary war put a full extinguisher upon the aboriginal legends. It suspended, by stronger characteristics, those of the fancy and imagination. But, very possibly, up to that period, the familiars of the red men continued to exercise their employments, and to maintain a certain reputation. There is a story of the olden time, when the settlements of the English colonists were chiefly confined to the rivers Ashley and Cooper, with a small group, here and there, on the Santee and Savannah, which I heard in my childhood, and which concerns this very neighbourhood, and relates to this very class of Indian goblins. The hero of it was a simple woodman, named Perkins or Larkins, I don't recollect which, but we will call him Larkins. He formed one of a class of whom we every now and then encounter a specimen still surviving -a tame, poor-spirited, good-natured, lazy creature, who had not the proper energies of manhood, and, having neither the world's goods nor gear, yet never made the slightest effort to secure them. How he lived, people could not well say, but his reputed business

was that of a woodcutter. He was occasionally employed by men of substance in the city, who owned lands along the Cooper and the Ashley, to cut and haul wood for them, either to the city, or to their boats upon the river. They allowed him to occupy a shanty whenever they employed him, upon the estate where he cut his wood. This was either fuel, or timber for shipping; at this occupation, chiefly, did he get his bread; but he was too indolent to make the labour profitable. He saved nothing, and a week or ten days' labour generally exhausted him; when he would lounge about the woods with an old gun, seeking squirrels or partridges, quite as much for sport as food. He was a listless, good-natured dog, with a small rheumatic sort of humour, and went about whistling or singing, when he had not a stiver in his pocket, or a potatoe in the ashes. In this region was he born; here he had lived all his life, and he never thought so greatly of improving his fortune, as at any time to meditate seeking it elsewhere. To roam the woods, to squat down at camp fires with the hunters or the waggoners, sing rude songs, and tell rough stories, and hear them, occasionally making a trip to the city, to lay in his small supplies of tobacco, sugar, coffee, and perhaps one bottle of Jamaica rum, never more at a time, for Larkins was temperate withal; these furnished the chief excitements of his life. Occasionally, he might be found making merry with his fiddle at some of the great plantations along the river, for he could draw a sharp bow, could Larkins, at Christmas, or other scasons of merry-making, when the young people happened to hear of his being in the neighbourhood. Though poor as Job's turkey, Larkins does not seem to have been much troubled with anxiety, and if not a rollocking blade, was at least not a desponding one. He felt assured that he could always make his daily bread, and he had a most religious disregard of what the morrow should bring forth. With slouched hat and homespun garments, he rambled in the woods, or hewed his timber, or fiddled for the young folks, or for himself in his lonely cabin, and gave himself but little concern about the improvement of his condition or his resources. He lived, something as a squatter, for a long period on the estates of a wealthy proprietor on Cooper river, in a spot very nearly parallel to that which we now occupy. His cabin was made of logs, and in one of the loneliest parts of the forest. This, as I said before, was a long while before the revolution, and when the condition of the country was very different from what it is at present. He

was tolerated in his abode, as he was frequently employed by the proprietor of the lands upon which he squatted. Here he fiddled, or whistled, or sung, when the day was over, sitting beside a rousing fire, for which the surrounding woods afforded him fuel in abundance. Here, at length, he had reason to think that he was not wholly companionless. He could detect noises at his door at night, sometimes a hoarse chuckle as of laughter, and particularly when he had finished some of his merry tunes. Occasionally, he was startled to perceive the singular and sudden diminution in his sack of corn, or peas, or potatoes, or ground-nuts, for which he could never account. That he should

Among the

be robbed was very surprising, for everybody regarded him with kindness. negroes, who were the persons he at first suspected, he was quite a favourite, as well on account of his fiddle as his fun. To protect his property he at length got himself a padlock, for, hitherto, his cabin door had never known the security of bolt or bar. But his lock was broken the first night after it was put on, and Larkins never thought to provide another. His provisions still disappeared, and while he somewhat wondered at the circumstance, he never allowed it to give him much uneasiness. Indeed, whatever might be the extent of the loss, he was soon reconciled to it. He began to have suspicions that the robbery was effected by a trespasser against whom he could obtain no damages, and towards whom he felt no resentments. Larkins was not without his superstitions. He had heard old stories, along the river, about the Indian elf, Logoochie, and, in his solitary life, these stories grew into a faith. The need of a companion soon found him one. As the heart craves, will it pray, and as it prays will it find. He remembered to have wished that Logoochie would come about his cabin, as he was reported to have come about the cabins of the people, who had by no means given the intruder a gentle reception. For his part, he should be glad to welcome the red goblin. Larkins may not have said so much in words, or aloud, but he felt thus, and very soon after he became aware of his losses in grain, potatoes, and ground-nuts; while he grew conscious, at the same time, of corresponding benefits. The game grew plentiful about his wigwam. He could always tumble one or more fox or cat squirrels from his roost-trees. He stumbled over vast flocks of partridges, sometimes five hundred in a gang; and almost every afternoon, he happened upon a fat rabbit leaping along his pathway. This was all very well calculated to reconcile our