504 REVIEWS — THE HAND-BOOK OF TORONTO. 



have frequented in great numbers a large -willo-w tree in Yonge street, nearly oppo- 

 site Gerrard street, and always appeared most sprightly and joyful when there was 

 any extra stir on the street." 



The only unpleasant additions to sucli paragraphs of civic natural 

 history are notes of information, that Mr. May shot upwards of fifty, 

 beautiful and delicate little humming birds during the past summer ; 

 or, that, of the Whip-poor- Will, whose plaintive cry is heard through- 

 out the whole summer's night : " During the present season a large 

 number of them have been shot in our neighborhood." Do our 

 citizens indulge in Whip-poor- Will pies, and Humming Bird tartlets ? 

 or are these feats of mis-called sport mere exhibitions of wanton de- 

 structiveness ? We learn indeed some curious hints of gastronomic 

 tastes. We grow our own turtles. Indeed Toronto Aldermen have a 

 choice in this respect, adapted to very varied tastes, from the Snap- 

 ping Turtle, which takes a lesurely meal of a duck, to the Mud 

 Terrapin, or Stinkpot : very abundant if not too savoury. Here are 

 a couple of notes for our Canadian Meg Dods, which must close our 

 notice of the city's Natural History : — 



" The Bull Frog (Eana pipiens), attains to a very large size, measuring from six 

 to seven inches in length, and having a corresponding corpulency. The hind legs 

 ("when cooked) are white, tender, and excellent eating. Some specimens weigh 

 half a pound." 



"The Spring Frog {Rana fontinalis) is the species which is so much esteemed 

 as a delicacy, although I am not aware that that nicely adjusted Epicurean taste 

 which would so peculiarly relish either Spring Frogs, or that other Imperial dish, 

 ' Peacock's biains,' is much cultivated in Toronto." 



The founder of the City of Toronto was Lieutenant-G-overnor 

 Simcoe, an Officer who had seen service in the American war, and a 

 Memben of the House of Commons in I791,when Canada was divid- 

 ed into the Upper and Lower Provinces. When, in the following 

 year, the new Governor entered on his duties the population of the 

 entire Province numbered little more than a third of the present 

 inhabitants of Toronto, and its first Parliament, consisting of an 

 Upper House of eight Members, and a Lower House, or Legislative 

 Assembly, of only double that number, met at Niagara, or Newark, 

 as the most populous village of the Upper Province was then called. 

 It is impossible to look back without feelings of lively interest on 

 this miniature reproduction in our first western clearing, of the old 

 Saxon institutions of British freedom : 



" The next point of importance for the Governor's consideration was the selection 

 of a Seat of Government, a question at all times seemingly surrounded with diffi- 



