the anatomical structure of the bird, it is known to be impossible for them to exist under water.

The frequent appearance of swallows on the verge of the water late in the autumn, and early in the spring, which had given rise to the above opinion, and which Mr. White notices in his History of Selbourne, makes it probable, that the transitory state of torpor, which we suppose some of them occasionally to undergo, is passed among the weeds and roots along the banks of ponds and lakes'.

Once in each revolving year,

Gentle bird! we find thee here.

When Nature wears her summer vest,
Thou com'st to weave thy simple nest;
But when the chilling winter lowers,
Again thou seek'st the genial bowers
Of Memphis, or the shores of Nile,
Where constant hours of verdure smile.

ANACREON.

That the nightingale retires to Egypt is confirmed by Sonnini, in his Travels.' 'I met, says he, with several nightingales, who frequent the most shady thickets in the vicinity of the water. They are silent in Egypt, which they leave in spring, to warble out their songs of love, and hail her arrival in other countries.'

Many of the small billed birds that feed on insects disappear when the cold weather commences. The throstle, the red-wing, and the fieldfare, which migrated in March, now return; and the ring-ouzel arrives from the Welsh and Scottish Alps to winter in more sheltered situations. All these birds feed upon berries, of which there is a plentiful supply, in our woods, during a great part of their stay. The throstle and the red-wing are delicate eating. Partridges are in great plenty at this season of the year.

There are in blow, in this month, nasturtia, china aster, marigolds, sweet peas, mignionette, golden rod, stocks, tangier pea, holy-oak, michaelmas daisy,

1

See Skrimshire's Essays on Natural History, vol. i, p. 85; and the former volumes of Time's Telescope.

saffron (crocus sativus), and ivy (hedera helix). Among the maritime plants may be named, the marsh glass-wort (salicornia herbacea), and the sea stork's bill (erodium maritimum), on sandy shores; and the officinal marshmallow (althæa officinalis) in salt marshes.

Herrings (clupea) pay their annual visit to England in this month, and afford a rich harvest to the inhabitants of its eastern and western coasts. Exclusive of the various methods of preparing this fish for sale, in different countries, an immense quantity of oil is drawn from it, forming a great and important commercial article among the northern nations.

Various of the feathered tribe now commence their autumnal music; among these, the thrush, the blackbird, and the woodlark, are now conspicuous. The phalana russula and the saffron butterfly (papilio hyale) appear in this month. Flies (musca) abound in our windows.

The CAPTIVE FLY.

Seduced by idle change and luxury,
See in vain struggles the expiring fly,
He perishes! for lo, in evil hour,

He rushed to taste of yonder garish flower,
Which in young beauty's loveliest colours drest,
Conceals destruction in her treacherous breast,
While round the roseate chalice odours breathe,
And lure the wanderer to voluptuous death.
Ill-fated vagrant! did no instinct cry,
Shun the sweet mischief?—No experienced fly
Bid thee of this fair smiling fiend beware,
And say, the false Apocynum is there?
Ah, wherefore quit for this Circean draught

The bean's ambrosial flower, with incense fraught;
Or where, with promise rich, Fragraria spreads
Her spangling blossoms on her leafy beds?
Could thy wild flight no softer blooms detain?
And towered the Lilac's purple groups in vain ?'
Or waving showers of golden blossoms, where
Laburnum's pensile tassels float in air,
When thou within those topaz keels might creep
Secure, and rocked by lulling winds to sleep?

But now no more for thee shall June unclose
Her spicy clove-pink, and her damask rose;
Not for thy food shall swell the downy peach,
Nor raspberries blush beneath th' embowering beech.
In efforts vain thy fragile wings are torn,
Sharp with distress resounds thy small shrill horn;
While thy gay happy comrades hear thy cry,
Yet heed thee not, and careless frolic by,
Till thou, sad victim! every struggle o'er,
Despairing sink, and feel thy fate no more.

C. SMITH.1

Rural scenery is now much enlivened by the variety of colours, some lively and beautiful, which are assumed, towards the end of the month, by the fading leaves of trees and shrubs. These appearances are very striking even in our own fine forests, but cannot be compared with the magnificent scenes presented to the eye of the enraptured traveller in the primeval woods which shade the equinoctial regions of Africa and America. See T. T. for 1817, p. 268, and our last volume, p. 235.

The autumnal equinox happens on the 22d of September, and, at this time, the days and nights are equal all over the earth. About this period, heavy storms of wind and rain are experienced, as well as at the vernal equinox.

As many of our readers will, probably, pass the month of September on the coast, we shall here introduce some reflections upon that most magnificent of all objects THE SEA.

With wonder mark the moving wilderness of waves,
From pole to pole through boundless space diffused,
Magnificently dreadful! where, at large,

Leviathan, with each inferior name

Of sea-born kinds, ten thousand thousand tribes,
Finds endless range for pasture and for sport.

1

Fenced with eternal mounds, the fluid sphere;

Conversations on Natural History, vol. i, p. 176.

With every wind to waft large commerce on,
Join pole to pole, consociate severed worlds,
And link in bonds of intercourse and love
Earth's universal family.

MALLET.

If we look upon a map of the world, we shall find that the ocean occupies a considerably greater surface of the globe than the land is found to do. This immense body of waters is diffused round both the old and new continent to the south, and may surround them also to the north, for what we know; but the ice in those latter regions has stopped our inquiries. Although the ocean, properly speaking, is but one extensive sheet of water, continued over every part of the globe, without interruption, and although no part of it is divided from the rest, yet geographers have distinguished it by different names; as the Atlantic or Western Ocean, the Northern, Southern, Pacific, Indian, and German Oceans.

In this vast receptacle, almost all the rivers of the earth ultimately terminate. And yet these vast and inexhaustible supplies do not seem to increase its stores; for it is neither apparently swollen by their tribute, nor diminished by their failure: it continues constantly the same. Indeed, the quantity of water of all the rivers and lakes in the world is nothing compared to that contained in this prodigious reservoir. And some natural philosophers have carried their ideas on this subject so far, as to assert, in consequence of certain calculations, that, if the bed of the sea were empty, all the rivers of the world flowing into it with a continuance of their present stores, would take up at least 800 years to fill it again to its present height.

Thus great is the assemblage of waters diffused round our habitable globe; and yet, immeasurable as it seems, it is rendered subservient principally to the necessities and conveniences of so little a being as man. Some have perceived so much analogy to man in the formation of the ocean, that they have

not hesitated to assert it was made for him alone. This has been denied by others; and a variety of arguments have been adduced on both sides, in which we do not think it necessary to enter here: for of this we are certain, that the great Creator has endowed us with abilities to turn this great extent of waters to our own advantage. He has made these things, perhaps, for other uses; but he has given us faculties to convert them to our own. This much agitated question, therefore, seems to terminate here: we shall never know whether the things of this world were made for our use; but we very well know that we were made to enjoy them. Let us then boldly affirm, that the earth and all its wonders are ours, since we are furnished with powers to force them into our service. Man is the lord of the whole sublunary creation; the howling savage, the winding serpent, with all the untameable and rebellious offspring of nature, are destroyed in the contest, or driven at a distance from his habitations. The extensive and tempestuous ocean, instead of dividing or limiting his power, only serves to assist his industry, and enlarge the sphere of his enjoyments. Its billows, and its monsters, instead of presenting a scene of terror, serve only to excite and invigorate the courage of this intrepid little being; and the greatest danger that man now fears from the deep, is from his fellow-creatures. Indeed, if we consider the human race as nature has formed them, very little of the habitable globe seems to be made for them. But when they are considered as accumulating the wisdom of ages, in commanding the earth, there is nothing so great, nor so terrible. What a poor contemptible being is the naked savage, standing on the beach of the ocean, and trembling at its tumults! How incapable is he of converting its terrors into benefits; or of saying, Behold an element made solely for my enjoyment!-He considers it as an angry deity, and pays it the homage of submis