502 Chit-chat, 



Von Os, There is a capital remark to that effect in Loudon's 

 Encyclopcedia of Plants, under the word Linnae'^ : — "It is 

 to be wished such another man (as Linnaeus), with equal 

 talent, industry, and judgment, could be found at the present 

 day, to rescue the science of natural history from the con- 

 fusion to which it is fast approaching." 



Dov. There is too great a fastidious nicety in splitting 

 genera. Nothing can be more felicitous than the Linnaean 

 method of giving each a generic and specific name, its infinite 

 combination, and vast power, contained in two words ; but, 

 when once affixed, they should be sacredly held permanently 

 immutable, unless involving some very glaring error. 



Von Os. I see the Jbraminous birds take very freely to the 

 pots and boxes you put up to the walls and trees. 



Dov. Yes ; and that in the tree opposite my book-room 

 window is now tenanted by a pair of nuthatches. They 

 reduced, as is their wont, the entrance-hole with clay, so 

 small, that when they go in or out, they are obliged to push 

 and wriggle very hard. I at first wondered at their reducing 

 it so small : but I had soon reason to approve their precaution, 

 for no sooner had they hatched their young, than the busy 

 starlings, with their strong bills, attempted a forcible entry, 

 and actually broke down part of the mud stoppage ; which the 

 intrepid and persevering occupants immediately proceeded to 

 repair, and victoriously fought, with might and main, pro arts 

 etfocis. The bottom of their sedile [roost] (for I can scarcely 

 call it a nest) is always strewn very thickly with the thin 

 lamince, or flaky bark, taken from the upper branches of old 

 Scotch pines : and this the impudent and prying tomtits will 

 throw out profusely. I think the nuthatch a most interesting 

 bird. 



Von Os. I have observed that the hole of the little wood- 

 pecker is cylindrical, while that of the nuthatch is slightly 

 conical, pointing inwards. 



Dov, Did you ever hear of suicidal woodcocks ? 



Von, Os, Suicidal woodcocks ? 



Dov. Ay. Being a few years ago at Holyhead, with our 

 friend Bowman and his pleasant family, we scrambled over 

 the rocks to see the fine light-house erected on a detached 

 crag called the South Stack ; to which we crossed on a flimsy 

 rickety bridge of ropes, suspended at a tremendous height 

 over the rolling waves that chafed and roared below. When 

 we had ascended the lofty tower into the lantern, the man 

 who conducted us struck with his fist, very hard, the large 

 panes of plate glass, and bade us do the same, to prove their 

 prodigious strength. He told us that, at migration time, the 



