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THE CABINET OF NATURAL HISTORY, 
ers, especially the summer bird-catchers, they who do not 
capture birds when they have congregated in winter, when 
they have no mates or young ones to feel the effects of 
their loss, and are ready for the table of the epicure, but 
who take only singing birds, and take them too wherever 
and whenever they can, without regard to their having 
young, which may perish by their absence, or to that 
harsh change, from the full enjoyment of summer sunshine 
and pleasures to the captivity of the cage. When I see 
their nets spread in the fields where birds resort, I wish 
them all manner of villainous ill-luck; and I never omit a 
favourable opportunity of deranging or destroying their 
snares when they fall in my way. 
There are none of our customs which more mark our 
selfishness than that of keeping singing birds in perpetual 
confinement, making the pleasure of our ears their misfor- 
tune; and that sweet gift, which God has given them, 
wherewith to make themselves happy, and the country 
delightful, the curse of their lives. If we were content- 
ed, however, with taking and rearing young ones, which 
never knew the actual blessing of liberty, or of propa- 
gating them in cages or avaries, the evil would not be so 
enormous. But the practice of seizing singing birds, 
which have always enjoyed the freedom of the earth and 
air, in summer when they are busy with the pleasant cares 
of their nests or young broods, and subjecting them to a 
close prison, is detestable — doubly detestable in the case 
of migratory birds, which have not merely the common 
love of liberty, but the instinct of migration to str uggle 
with. To behold a bird which God has created to fly from 
land to land to crown the pleasantness of spring with the 
most delicious music, or which he has made to soar, in the 
rapture of its heart, up to heaven’s gates, “cribbed, cabined, 
and confined” in a narrow cage by man, is one of the 
most melancholy objects on earth. Let those who have 
hearts for it keep them, and listen to them with what 
pleasure they may; for my part, while I am myself sensi- 
ble of the charms of freedom, and of the delights of the 
summer fields, I shall continue to prefer the “ wood notes 
wild” of liberty to a captive’s wail . — Book of Seasons . 
EARLY AWAKENING OF BIRDS. 
At one period of my life, being an early waker and 
riser, my attention was frequently drawn “to songs of 
earliest birds;” and I always observed that these creatures 
appeared abroad at very different periods as the light ad- 
vanced. The rook is perhaps the first to salute the open- 
ing morn; but this bird seems rather to rest than to sleep. 
Always vigilant, the least alarm after retirement rouses 
instantly the whole assemblage, not successively, but col- 
lectively. It is appointed to be a ready mover. Its prin- 
cipal food is worms, which feed and crawl upon the humid 
surface of the ground in the dusk, and retire before the 
light of day; and, roosting higher than other birds, the 
first rays of the sun, as they peep from the horizon, be- 
come visible to it. The restless, inquisitive robin now is 
seen too. This is the last bird that retires in the even- 
ing, being frequently flitting about when the owl and bat 
are visible, and awakes so soon in the morning, that little 
rest seems required by it. Its fine large eyes are fitted 
to receive all, even the weakest rays of light that appear. 
The worm is its food too, and few that move upon the sur- 
face escape its notice. The cheerful melody of the wren 
is the next we hear, as it bustles from its ivied roost; and 
we note its gratulation to the young-eyed day, when twi- 
light almost hides the little minstrel from our sight. The 
sparrow roosts in holes, and under the eaves of the rick 
or shed, where the light does not so soon enter, and hence 
is rather a tardy mover; but it is always ready for food, 
and seems to listen to what is going forward. We see it 
now peeping from its penthouse, inquisitively surveying 
the land; and, should provision be obtainable, it imme- 
diately descends upon it without any scruple, and makes 
itself a welcome guest with all. It retires early to rest. 
The black-bird quits its leafy roost in the ivied ash; its 
“chink, chink,” is heard in the hedge; and, mounting on 
some neighbouring oak, with mellow, sober voice, it gra- 
tulates the coming day. “The plain-song cuckoo gray” 
from some tall tree now tells its tale. The lark is in the 
air, the “ martin twitters from her earth-built shed,” all 
the choristers are tuning in the grove; and amid such 
tokens of awakening pleasure it becomes difficult to note 
priority of voice. These are the matin voices of the sum- 
mer season; in winter a cheerless chirp, or a hungry twit, 
is all we hear; the families of voice are away, or silent; 
we have little to note, and perhaps as little inclination to 
observe. — Jour, of a Naturalist. 
SINGULAR OCCURRENCE. 
A few weeks since, as one of our sportsmen was out 
gunning, in the vicinity of this place, his dog started a 
wookcock, which he immediately fired at and hit, whilst 
flying rapidly with the wind; and such was the impetus it 
had acquired by the rapidity of its flight, that in descend- 
ing in nearly a horizontal line to the earth, it struck a corn 
stalk, which was penetrated entirely through by its bill , 
by which it hung suspended to the corn stalk, and in which 
situation it was found by the gentleman who shot it. 
f Reading Chronicle. 
