200 THE ISLAND OF JAVA. 
entangled and caught in them, as in artificial nets. A 
grave gentleman in London observed to me one day how 
much he was surprized to find so marvellous an account of 
the strength of spider-webs inserted in so valuable a book as 
the Authentic Account of an Embassy to China. On being 
told that I could inform him of something not less marvellous 
respecting the spidei^ who made them, which was that the 
nails of their fore claAvs were so large and strong, that it was 
a common practice in Batavia to have them mounted on gold 
or silver handles, and to use them as tooth-picks, I have little 
doubt he was ready to exclaim with Gay, 
The man who with undaunted toils 
Sails unknown seas to unknown soils, 
*' What various wonders feast his sight, 
Wha£ stranger wonders does he write i" 
It is scarcely necessary to add that the forests and the 
mountains of Java produce an immense number and variety 
of the feathered race, from the large cassowary or emeu to 
the minute humming bird little larger than the common bee ; 
and though the plumage of the birds of Java may not perhaps 
be put in competition with that of the feathered race of South 
America, which taken collectively are unquestionably the most 
splendid in the world, yet many of the loories and paroquets 
are here singularly beautiful. Of that elegant bird the Argus 
pheasant we procured a number of perfect specimens, but it is 
said to be rarely brought alive out of the woods. The fire- 
backed pheasant, the crowned pigeon, the Fulica Forphyrio, 
the several birds of Paradise, the various species of Oriolus 
or golden thrush, and of the Alcedo or kingfisher, and, to de- 
scend to the smaller kinds, as the Java sparrows or rice 
