4-0 Illustrations in British Zoology : — 



chilling blasts. The redstart is gone to Africa ; the chaffinch 

 has retired to the hawthorn hedges : the ringdoves, having 

 lost half of their notes by the first week in October, became 

 mute about ten days ago ; and have left the ivy tower, to join 

 their congregated associates, which now chiefly feed in the 

 turnip fields ; and will return no more to the ivy tower until 

 the middle of February. The jackdaws are here, morning 

 and evening, and often at noon ; and at nightfall they never 

 fail'to join the passing flocks of rooks in their evening flight 

 to their eastern roosting-place at Nostell Priory, and return 

 with them after daybreak. The starlings retire to a dense 

 plantation of spruce fir and beech trees, and in the morning 

 come to the ivy tower to warble their wild notes, even when the 

 frosts set in. These birds are now in their winter garb, which 

 they assumed at the autumnal equinox, much duller, and of a 

 more greyish white appearance, than that which they had in 

 the summer. I cannot find that naturalists have noticed this 

 change. 



The starling seems to be well aware of the peaceful and 

 inoffensive manners of the windhover. This hawk rears its 

 young in a crow's old nest, within two hundred yards of the 

 ivy tower. Still, the starlings betray no fears when the wind- 

 hover passes to and fro ; but they become terribly agitated on 

 the approach of the sparrowhawk. I often see this bold 

 destroyer glide in lowly flight across the lake, and strike a 

 starling and carry it off, amid the shrieks and uproar of the 

 inhabitants of the tower and sycamore trees. 



The starling shall always have a friend in me. I admire 

 it, for its fine shape and lovely plumage ; I protect it for its 

 wild and varied song ; and I defend it for its innocence. 



Charles Waterton. 

 Walton Hall, November 3. 1832. 



Art. VII. Illustrations in British Zoology. By George John- 

 ston, M.D., Fellow of the Royal College of Surgeons in Edin- 

 burgh. 



The bizarre figures here delineated may remind some of 

 your readers of a passage in Pliny, which says : — " While I 

 contemplated Nature, she wrought in me a persuasion, that 

 I should look upon nothing as .incredible that related to her ;" 

 and the additional experience of many centuries seems to 

 have added only greater force to the justness of this remark. 



The first figure (Jig. 7. a) represents the 

 7. Capre'lla acumini'fera, 

 a small crustaceous insect, which has not, so far as I am 



