Notes at Brighton. 145 



common world denounces, whistles around with icy effect, 

 though a few minutes since, when you breasted it in the 

 glow of healthy exercise, you exulted in defying its power. 



When, by and by, this incomparable stretch of fertile 

 plain is hidden far and wide with virgin snow, it requires 

 something more than the otherwise welcome horn or hound- 

 cry to entice you from your lofty stand-point 



But at present there is one horseman who is called away 

 from the scene of action j for this is to be a day of beast, 

 fish, and bird. So, steady, bonny chestnut, until we reach 

 the bottom, and then rein shall be drawn no more till home 

 is reached. 



The casual visitor to the Brighton Aquarium runs through 

 it in much the same way as some of our Transatlantic 

 kindred are said to run through Europe. His aim is to 

 " do " and not to study it. To get all that is to be got out 

 of an aquarium, you must be there, now in the morning, 

 now at noon, now at night, with a heart sealed against 

 the seductions of music, refreshment-buffets, or company. 

 Thus you may observe the fishes in their moods of dulness 

 and of liveliness, in their conditions of hunger and satiety, 

 in sickness and in health. 



The people who pay the Brighton sea-lions a visit, pro- 

 bably find them in the water, looking, I dare say, pretty 

 much as usual. Dropping in at a very early hour one 

 morning I saw the lion that is the male creature under, 

 to me, peculiarly agreeable circumstances. He had not 

 gone into the water, but lay on the rocky edge of the tank, 

 very sullen and unhappy, probably not having yet got over 

 his long journey from California. The seasonable dryness 

 of the atmosphere had dried his skin, and instead of the 



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