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the pleasure to see the animal move toward the seize on it, and eat it.'

prey,

Like all other kinds of animals, shell fish have their particular resorts; some inhabit only the deep parts of the sea, some are found in less depths, others in shallows, in bays, and even on the shores; it has been also observed, that many very fine and rare speeimens are sometimes found in narrow straits between islands, and in shallows of four or five fathom

water.

The best live shells are collected by means of a trawling-net, such as are used by fishermen, if the depths will permit; they are also brought up by the cable in weighing anchor, the log-line in sounding, &c.

After a storm, good shells may be picked up on the sea beaches, or shores, as the violent agitation of the water in a tempest separates them from their native beds, and often casts them on the shore; but such as have been exposed for some time to the heat of the sun, or beaten by the waves, are of little value, as their colours will be faded, and the shells worn and broken choose, therefore, always such shells as lie in the deepest parts of their resorts and under water, whether taken up by the drag-net, from the sides of rocks, or bottoms of ships, &c.

River shells are, in general, very obscure in appearance, seldom admit of elegant colouring, and are extremely thin and brittle.-See Donovan's Instructions for collecting and preserving Subjects of Natural History, p. 59, to which ingenious work we also refer for the mode of cleaning and preserving shells, lithophyta, zoophyta, &c. To preserve marine plants, sea-weeds, &c., consult our last volume, p. 183.

In myriads now are caught, of heav'nly blue,
The boney pilchard, robed in silver too,
One haul producing oft upon the shore
Full sixteen thousand fish, and sometimes more;
For frying famed, while some, in pickle stowed,
Preserve till winter in their hooped abode.

Y

The pilchard, though smaller, bears a strong resemblance to the herring, and is, by persons fond of the latter fish, very much esteemed; though, if possible, more boney. The pilchard is salted in large quantities, and sent to London in casks; where, in that state, it eats very much like the anchovy. These fish are caught in immense quantities during the season, and are sold at one shilling, and one and sixpence the hundred.

Now oft, prognostic of approaching gales,

The dark and flound'ring porpoise inland sails;
O'er ocean's breakers rears its curvy back,

Studding the green and white with nobs of black.

This very ugly creature generally approaches the land previously to a high gale of wind coming on, and is sometimes hauled in with the seine, though not frequently. The fisherman will often skin the porpoise, which he causes to be tanned, and then converts it into shoe leather.

Cucumbers, which are very plentiful in this month, are grown in great quantities at Sandy in Bedfordshire and the neighbouring country. They are sown in the open ground, in drills, every eight or nine days, that some seed may always be in the ground to come up and succeed, in case that which is up should be cut off by the frost. In this state, perhaps, half, or a whole acre of ground or more, is to be seen with cucumber plants in all stages. Two thousand bushels have been sold out of the parish of Sandy in one week. They are carried by the gardeners with carts to St. Neots, Cambridge, London, and as far as Stamford in Lincolnshire, and sold at the low price of three large or five smaller ones for a penny they have been sold as low as sixteen for a penny. To persons who have hitherto seen cucumbers growing only in frames, or under hand-glasses, this extensive manner of growing them, and the cottages situated in the gardens, may serve to illus-trate a passage in the first chapter of Isaiah (verse 8),

"The daughter of Zion is left as a cottage in a vineyard, as a LODGE in a garden of CUCUMBERS.'

The method of preserving the seed is, when the fruit is ripe, to cut the seed out into a tub, and let it remain till it begins to ferment; then put it into water, and wash it from the mucus, and spread it upon cloths to dry.

INSCRIPTION for a GROTTO.

To me whom in their lays the shepherds call
Actea, daughter of the neighbouring stream,
This cave belongs. The fig-tree and the vine,
Which o'er the rocky entrance downward shoot,
Were placed by Glycon. He with cowslips pale,
Primrose, and purple lychnis, decked the green,
Before my threshold, and my shelving walls
With honey-suckle covered. Here at noon,
Lulled by the murmur of the rising fount,
I slumber: here my clustering fruits I tend.
Or from the humid flowers, at break of day,
Fresh garlands weave, and chase from all
Each thing impure or noxious. Enter in,
O stranger, undismayed. Nor bat nor toad
Here lurks: and if thy breast of blameless thoughts
Approve thee, not unwelcome shalt thou tread
My quiet mansion: chiefly, if thy name
Wise Pallas, and the immortal Muses own.

my

bounds

AKENSIDE.

SEPTEMBER.

SEPTEMBER is composed of septem, seven, and the termination ber, like lis in Aprilis, Quintilis, Sextilis. This rule will also apply to the three following months, Octo-ber, Novem-ber, Decem-ber. Our Saxon ancestors called it Gerst-monat, for that barley which that moneth commonly yeelded was antiently called gerst.'

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Remarkable Days.

1. SAINT GILES.

GILES, or Ægidius, was born at Athens, but came to France in the year 715. Charles Martel, when hunting, found him in his hermit's cell, and, pleased with his unaffected piety and sanctity of manners, erected an abbey for him at Nismes, of which he was constituted abbot. He died in the year 795.

*1. 1715. LOUIS XIV died.

During the reign of this king, the privileges of the Protestants in France were gradually infringed; and missionaries were sent for their conversion, supported by regiments of dragoons, who exercised the most horrid cruelties upon the defenceless Protestants in the south of France, particularly at Montauban and Nantes. This bigoted sovereign declared, in his letters of instruction to his officers, That it was his Majesty's will that the extreme of rigour should be employed against those who refused to become of his religion.' In 1685, the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes, first granted by Henry IV, and confirmed by Louis XIII, deprived the Protestants of all exercise of their religion, and tore from them their children to be educated Catholics. Vast numbers of Protestants, in consequence, left the kingdom, and carried their arts and industry to foreign and hostile

nations.

2.-LONDON BURNT.

The fire of London broke out on Sunday morning, September 2d, 1666, O.S.; and, being impelled by strong winds, raged with irresistible fury, nearly four days and nights; nor was it entirely mastered till the fifth morning after it began. For an interesting account of this tremendous fire, written by an eyewitness, we refer to our last volume, pp. 249-258.

*3. 1658.-OLIVER CROMWELL Died. Oliver Cromwell was of a robust make and constitution; his aspect manly, though clownish. His education extended no further than a superficial knowledge of the Latin tongue, but he inherited great talents from nature; though they were such as he could not have exerted to advantage at any other juncture than that of a civil war, inflamed by religious contests. His character was formed from an amazing conjuncture of enthusiasm, hypocrisy, and ambition. He was possessed of courage and resolution, that overlooked all dangers, and saw no difficulties. He dived into the characters of mankind with wonderful sagacity, while he concealed his own purposes under the impenetrable shield of dissimulation.

He reconciled the most atrocious crimes to the most rigid notions of religious obligations. From the severest exercise of devotion, he relaxed into the most ridiculous and idle buffoonery: yet he preserved the dignity and distance of his character in the midst of the coarsest familiarity. He was cruel and tyrannic from policy; just and temperate from inclination; perplexed and despicable in his discourse; clear and consummate in his designs; ridiculous in his reveries; respectable in his conduct; in a word, the strangest compound of villany and virtue, baseness and magnanimity, absurdity and good sense, that we find on record in the annals of mankind.-Noble.

7.--SAINT EUNERCHUS. Eunerchus, or Evortius, was bishop of Orleans, and present at the council of Valentia, A.D. 375. 8.-NATIVITY OF THE VIRGIN MARY.

A concert of angels having been heard in the air to solemnize this important event, the festival was appointed by Pope Servius about the year 695.

*10. 1806.-J. C. ADELUNG DIED.

Adelung, so well known in the literature of Germany, by his great Grammatical and Critical Dic

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