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THE FIRST FLUTTERINGS 

 OF THE WING. 



There is never a man, unlettered, ignorant, exliausted, 

 insensible, who can deny himself a sentiment of rever- 

 ence, I might almost say of terror, on entering the 

 halls of our Museum of Natural History. 



No foreign collection, as far as my knowledge ex- 

 tends, produces this impression. 



Others, undoubtedly, as the superb museum of 

 Lej-den, are richer in particidar branches; but none are 

 more complete, none more harmonious. This sublime harmony 

 is felt instinctively; it imposes and seizes on the mind. The 

 inattentive traveller, the chance visitor, is unwillingly aifected; 

 he pauses, and he dreams. In the presence of this vast enigma, of 

 this immense hieroglyph which for the first time is displayed before 

 him, he may consider himself fortunate if he can read a character or 



