H4 Notes and Comments. 



property, but happily no lives were lost. The most awful 

 event of this character was the bursting of the Bilberry reser- 

 voir, three miles above Holmfirth, on the morning of the 5th 

 February, 1852. During the week previous to this date, 

 there had been almost incessant rain, and every streamlet was 

 swollen into a torrent. 



THE BILBERRY RESERVOIR. 



This reservoir, which was fed by these streams, was unusu- 

 ally full ; indeed, it is calculated that when the embankment 

 gave way, there was not less than " 86,248,000 gallons of 

 water in it, or the enormous and fearful amount of 300,000 

 tons in weight." The rain had ceased, and the moon shone 

 out bright and clear over one of the most lovely valleys in 

 England ; the tired and weary labourers were all enjoying 

 their sweet repose, oblivious alike of toil and danger, save a 

 few who had serious apprehensions for the safety of the em- 

 bankments, and who stood on the hills above contemplating 

 the quiet scene, when about one o'clock the vast mass of water 

 burst its bounds, and rushed down the valley with the voice 

 of ten thousand thunders, carrying death and destruction in 

 its headlong course. Factories, bridges, trees, and even 

 villages were but as straws before its surging front ; boilers, 

 vats, and utensils of all descriptions floated down on the rushing 

 wave, and were deposited many miles from their original 

 situations. The scene presented, when daylight appeared, 

 was harrowing in the extreme — more particularly at Diglee 

 Mill, which had borne the first brunt of the rushing waters. 

 The tall chimney twice bent like a willow to the force of the 

 current, but it finally resisted the attack, and stood a solitary 

 monument, amid the wide-spread desolation. No less than 

 eighty-one persons perished on this awful night ; property to 

 the amount of nearly £200,000 was destroyed, and seven 

 thousand artisans were thrown out of employment.' 



BIRD ' STUFFERS ' 



Referring to the paper ' On arranging Museum Cases for 

 Birds ' in our February issue, a ' taxidermist of 33 years' 

 standing,' who is a well-known Yorkshire naturalist, writes 

 at some length, more in sorrow than in anger. But our 

 remarks on the weird ways of ' country stuhers ' were not 

 intended to apply to the scientific taxidermist ; and after 

 all, they were more or less introductory to the main grievance 

 we had, viz., the lack of system adopted by both ' stuffers ' 

 and ' taxidermists ' alike, in regard to the dimensions of the 

 cases. To some extent our correspondent confirms the opinion 

 we expressed as to the desirability of a definite standard : 

 he gives the reasons why there are not, some of which we know. 

 Anyway, if people ordering and paying for the cases insist 

 on certain sizes, possibly they would get them. 



Naturalist, 



