COMMON OBJECTS OF THE SHORE, 345 



nest in such a form as to take so little room, that 

 the bird may cover them while sitting. 



The limits of this little work have allowed but 

 a passing mention of a few of the many birds of 

 our coast, but all have seen them skimming over 

 the sea, or diving into it, and have heard their 

 wild cries. Like all birds, they seem happy crea- 

 tures, till the fowler comes, with the just right 

 which God has given him over the lower animals, 

 and takes some of them for food, and others for 

 their downy plumage ; or, till some cruel marksman, 

 who needs them not, and who has no regard for 

 their grace or beauty, aims at them as they are 

 rejoicing in God's sunshine, and leaves their dead 

 bodies to float on the waves, or sends them, with 

 crippled wing, to endure the short remains of life 

 in pain and misery. It would be well could all 

 feel with Cowper's gentle pleadings for kindness 

 to the lower animals, and come to the same result 

 as did the poet in his arguings, 



" The sum is this : 



If man's convenience, health, or safety interfere, 

 His rights and claims are paramount, and must extinguish theirs : 

 Else they are all, the meanest thing that lives, 

 As free to live, and to enjoy that life, 

 As God was free to form them at the first, 

 Who in his sovereign wisdom made them all" 



THE END. 



TKtET HILL. 



