WILD LIFE AT HOME, AND ABROAD. 2OI 



Central Asia, among the herds of Wild Horses, Wild Donkeys, 

 Wild Camels, and Wild Sheep? 



The Flowers of the Holy Land, and the Cedars of Lebanon, 

 would doubtless call forth our admiration, and we might flit 

 right away to patriotic Canada to Sleighland and Snowland. 

 The Pariah Dogs of the East and the Java Peacock would no 

 doubt attract us, or to suddenly see coming over the horizon 

 on the vast Desert the caravan, with its following of Vultures 

 and other preying birds. 



We might visit the East and the West Indies, China and 

 Japan, and zealously pursue our studies of the Fauna there 

 found; or, coming somewhat nearer home again, we might go 

 to Germany, and observe the various wild life, and rural 

 delights, of that mighty Empire. 



What of great Russia, and her hungry, prowling Wolves and 

 Brown Bears? Alas, how feeble a treatment of such a vast 

 Country, and yet we must press on. 



What an enthralling sight to stand and gaze upon those 

 millions of Penguins and other Sea birds at the Falkland Islands, 

 to literally wade through them, so travellers tell me, and onwards 

 I might proceed. I might write volumes on the subject under 

 consideration, and then only have brushed the fringe of it 

 aside. We have now only touched slightly upon the great 

 Continents of Europe, Asia, Africa, America, Australia, and such 

 other Countries as occur to me as I write, before coming to 

 Britain, but, after all, this is only just a glimpse of one corner 

 of this great Nature picture, and a poor and unpretentious 

 treatment of a subject which has engaged the attention of so 

 many master minds. 



On the other side of the canvas we have the dear homeland, 

 the land of the freeborn. Vast and great, captivating, fasci- 

 nating, and awe-striking it may be to visit other lands 

 some of which I have so feebly touched upon but give me 

 Great Britain with its Daisy and Buttercup-spangled meadows, 

 and green-swarded pasture lands ; its tiny rivulets and sluggish 

 streams; its lakes and meres where the Kingfishers and the 

 Wagtails supply studies which might engage a lifetime, and 

 where the Little Grebes dob to their heart's content. Take 

 me to a green lane, or a secluded wood in Hertfordshire; 



