PREFACE. 



LIVING in the country, and possessing a taste for 

 Natural History, it is not surprising that I should 

 have been led to write about surrounding objects. 



Contributions to various periodicals, especially to 

 ' The Quarterly Journal of Agriculture/ have thus in 

 the course of time become so numerous that it has 

 been thought desirable to publish a selection from 

 them in the present form ; revised, that is, and it 

 is hoped improved by being curtailed or added to 

 as seemed to be necessary. 



The alimentary virtues of Horse-Flesh and Fungi 

 are discussed with a half -earnest levity: I use 

 the language of earnest conviction when directing 

 public attention to the great storehouse within which 

 the Universal Parent has laid up exhaustless sup- 

 plies of food. We may be squeamish as to the eating 

 of cheval soup and other dainty preparations from 

 the flesh of the horse ; fear may hinder us feasting 

 on Fungi; but with the sea as our fish-pond, and 



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