The Journal of a Naturalist, 185 



ments of destruction to the insect world/* Danger often 

 lurks amid flowers, as we all know ; and it is not exclusively 

 to insects that they prove fatal ; many animals, men included, 

 have been destroyed by their poisonous juices: it has even 

 been asserted that human life has been cut off' by their per- 

 fume only ; and in cases of infection, as the plague, flowers 

 have been supposed active in conveying its evil influence. 

 Yet we do not the less look upon them as emblems of purity 

 and innocence. The flowers (more especially alluded to in 

 this passage) which, by their construction, make captive or 

 destroy the insects attracted by their honey, are few ; we may 

 rejoice that they are so, for, although we may acquit them of 

 any " wanton cruelty," and, remembering the distinction of 

 Shakspeare's grave-digger, admit that the insects went to the 

 flower, not the flower to the insects ; yet it is not pleasant to 

 see a flower covered with its little victims. I do not, however, 

 consider the matter in so serious a light as this gentleman 

 appears to do. All creatures were born to suffer death ; and 

 I rather incline to pity the flower, that it is doomed to become 

 the unsightly agent of their destruction, than the little flies 

 that escape the spider's net to be smothered in a blossom. 

 Some persons believe that their destruction is necessary to the 

 wellbeing of the plant, but there seems little ground for such 

 a notion. 



The greater part of the volume is devoted to birds, treating 

 of their songs, nests, migrations, food, and various habits ; 

 and this we suspect to be the portion which the author has 

 written with the most pleasure to himself. He evidently speaks 

 from his own personal observation ; and* though he tells us 

 little that is new, the nature of the Subject, and his evident 

 interest in it, beguile us into more pleasure in his companion- 

 ship than we can account for, in reviewing the matter of his 

 discourse. 



In speaking of the rook as the only bird that returns to the 

 nest it has once forsaken, I conjecture the writer must mean 

 to except the season of incubation. ' The rook revisits its old 

 nest at a season of the year when it has no young family to 

 shelter there, but is not the only bird that revisits its nest at 

 other seasons. The marten will frequently rear its young in 

 the nest of the former year ; and if the custom be not more 

 general, it appears to arise from the injury these frail habit- 

 ations may have received from time and the elements ; which 

 makes the building of a new one the less trouble of the two. 

 The swallow commonly returns to its old haunts ; and, though 

 it builds a new nest, frequently contrives to save labour, by 

 placing it so immediately above the former one as to be sup- 



VoL.IL — No. 7. o -, . . 



