i 
66 THE CABINET OF NATURAL HISTORY, 
And even things inanimate—the streams 
And flowers—seem to own their pleasant dreams. 
Man, too, his heart with rapture sweetly filled, 
Feeling fresh life thro’ all his frame distilled, 
Blessing the hand that bids thee gaily bound 
Through Nature’s fields to strew thy joys around, 
Looks o’er the land, delightfully serene, 
Where human passions have not marred the scene, 
And seeing all in tranquil beauty gay, 
Hails the fair queen of Nature, rosy May! 
From the New-England Galaxy. 
SOME PASSAGES FROM THE DIARY OF A 
SPORTSMAN. 
[Continued from page 42.] 
I am convinced from long observation, that persons who 
live on or near the sea-board of New-England, are more 
prone to wage war against the wild fowl which frequent 
the salt marshes and sea beach, than the birds which are 
found only in the woods. There are periods of the year 
when wood game and sea game may be found in equal 
abundance, and at such times I have remarked, that while 
the woods are undisturbed, save by an occasional report, 
the sea-shore is fairly besieged with gunners, and a con- 
stant discharge of musquetry maintained. The more 
scientific and fastidious Sportsman, however, prefers to 
take his chance against a solitary wood-bird, and confines 
his skill to the partridge, snipe, quail, woodcock, and that 
magnificent bird, which is found only in lonely and uncul- 
tivated moors, the Grouse. But the great body of sports- 
men, the militia of gunners, if I may so speak, press eagerly 
toward the sea, and carry on a most destructive warfare 
against the goose, the coot, the teal, the yellow-leg and 
gray-back plover, the gray and black duck, the widgeon, 
curlew, the dipper, the doe-bird, and the keen-eyed and 
strong-winged loon. So also the younger class of these 
water-shooters practice their boyish skill upon the quern- 
lous little peep, the brown-back, ring-neck, e¢ id omne 
genus, not the least illustrious of which is that strange and 
solitary bird, which the boys have baptised with a very 
significant name, in allusion to its awkward habit of con- 
tinually bobbing up and down, with the ill grace of a vil- 
lage posture-master. 
There is, it must be acknowledged, a world of enjoyment 
in pursuing these wanderers of the deep, from beach to 
beach, or in invading the enemy on their own element, 
by tossing about upon the rolling billow, in a mere shell, 
no bigger than a fairy’s barge. There is something in the 
very sound and sight of the great sea itself,—something 
in the roar of the perpetual surge, in the flash of the 
breaking billow, that leads the step with an irresistible 
influence to its borders, and fills the mind with an engross- 
ing charm, which no time or change can dissolve. When- 
ever my foot presses that white and sandy floor, which is 
washed by the clear billow of the sea, there is communi- 
cated to my footstep the elasticity, to my body the vigour, 
to my mind the joy and exhilaration of the free-born 
Highlander, when his tartan is fluttering in the wild 
breeze of his own mountain land, and his foot is on the 
heather of its own native hills. As I enter upon that 
bright and golden border, which seems to extend without 
limit, along the edge of the ocean; as I glance upon the 
multitudinous billows, which race up its shelving bosom, 
and then with a musical ripple retire into their bed again; 
as I gaze abroad upon the expanded main itself, crested 
with uncounted billows, covered with a thousand passing 
sails, and traversed by a thousand snowy pinions, I can- 
not but feel an exultation which the world cannot give, 
and which, for a time, the world cannot take away. 
Gentle reader, did you ever shoot a Peep? In all pro- 
bability you will confess that your earliest essays with the 
gun, were directed against that numerous and diminutive 
species of game. Wherever there is a small patch of salt 
marsh, or a little pool deserted by the tide, you are sure to 
meet a detachment of some half-score of those winged 
rovers, and if you will only tread lightly, you may slay 
or make captive the whole party. If your fire destroys 
but one-half, the remainder of the thoughtless creatures, 
after revolving for a few moments in the air, and raising a 
shrill scream of lamentation, will drop down into their for- 
mer position, to look after their fellows, and thus become 
an easy prey to you. But the grown-up Sportsman, of 
course, disdains to notice such pigmy pinions, but leaves 
them to be picked off by the small birding piece of his 
younger brother. We remember the day, when we toiled 
mile after mile, over rock, bush, and briar, through mud, 
and quaking quagmires, and yielding marshes, till the 
evening came suddenly upon us in the midst of a dreary 
desert, far distant from ourhome. We had taken but few 
victims to console us for our fatigue. For they contrived 
to baffle all our cunning, and whenever we had crept suffi- 
ciently near for a shot, and when in the very act of kneel- 
ing, that the execution might be the more destructive, 
away they would all scamper, uttering in triumph their 
provoking whistle. It is their habit to alight in a body, and 
if the shooter fires instantly, and before they have had 
time to disperse in pursuit of their food, the whole flock 
may be disposed of at ashot. We availed ourself of seve- 
