QC>2 FALCO ^SALON. 



which one of them presently seizes, and appropriates 

 to himself. Now she is off. But what is that on the 

 hill top ? A hawk, " I guess," with a burden as large 

 as itself. It comes, and that not slowly. It has ar- 

 rived. A golden plover, with its beautiful black breast, 

 margined with white, stood on the top of a mossy 

 mound, that overlooked a bog covered with the " snowy 

 canna of the hill " of my great grandfather old Ossian, 

 the Eriophorum angustifolium of my brethren in arms, 

 the modern botanists, those " sons of little men," or 

 men of great souls, as you please; when suddenly there 

 came upon him the ruthless plunderer. Loud scream- 

 ed the bird of the moors, as he sprung on wing, and 

 sped his rapid flight. It was a beautiful sight to be 

 seen. Like a pirate chasing a merchantman among the 

 shoals of Cuba, did the Merlin thread the mazes of the 

 plover's path, until at length, coming down upon him 

 at an unlucky turn, he drove him to the ground stun- 

 ned and gasping, his right pulmonary vein ruptured, 

 (as you might have guessed had you seen the bright 

 blood that issued from his mouth, for had it been the 

 artery, as you well know, the blood would have been 

 dark). There the ruthless marauder squeezed and 

 pushed him with his talons, like a burker of true breed, 

 and scalped him, as a red man of " the Ohio woods " 

 used to scalp the pioneers fifty years ago, and screamed 

 over him, like a smoked Cossack over a murdered 

 Frenchman " in the hundred days." 



Let him divide the prey ; for see, how gorgeous the 

 crimsoned canopy that hangs over the eastern waters ! 

 The plains of Lothian stretch toward the sea, covered 

 with woods and corn, farm-houses and villages. There 



