CHAPTER V. 



How wond'rous is this scene ! where all is formed 

 With number, weight, and measure ! all designed 

 For some great end ! where not alone the plant 

 Of stately growth, the herb of glorious hue, 

 Or foodful substance ; not the labouring steed, 

 The herd and flocks that feed us, not the mine 

 That yields us stores for elegance and use ; 

 The sea that loads our tables, and conveys 

 The wanderer man from clime to clime ; 

 The rolling spheres that from on high shed down 

 Their kindly influence : not these alone 

 Which strike e'en eyes incurious ; but each moss, 

 Each shell, each crawling insect holds a rank 

 Important in the plan of Him who framed 

 This scale of beings ; holds a rank which lost 

 Would break the chain, and leave behind a gap 

 Which nature's self would rue. 



STILLINGFLEET. 



NATURAL HISTORY OF SOUTHPORT 

 AND ITS ENVIRONS. 



MJ^HE Natural History of Southport, surrounded as it is 

 ~*^ with sheer sand, extending inland for some miles, would 

 appear to offer little variety in its objects, yet it possesses a 

 Fauna by no means contemptible. Of Quadrupeds there 

 are none but the ordinary little creatures familiar to every- 

 one ; of Birds, an extensive variety ; of Reptiles, none of the 

 family of snakes, but an abundance of other kinds ; of 



