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while others are taken as boarders. Strays are fetched and 
destroyed free if necessary, but a small fee is charged for those 
whose owners can pay. Full information is forwarded on appli- 
cation. The Manageress is an anti-vivisectionist. Every town 
ought to be provided with such institutions, as being very 
merciful to the animals themselves and a highly sanitary 
measure to the inhabitants. The Institution is in need of 
funds. I have been greatly helped by this Home in the case of 
strays, and in that of an old pet cat who had ceased to enjoy 
life ; and can recommend it to Philaelurus and others, to whom 
it may not be known.” 
Nature-Teaching in Elementary Schools. — The Rev. 
A. F. Curtis, Vicar of White Notley, Essex, writes : — 
“ If any of your readers are Managers of Elementary Schools, 
may I suggest to them a plan I have adopted with success for 
interesting children in natural history and educating their powers 
of observation, namely: (i) the monthly issue of a number of 
copies of Nature Notes as reading books for the upper classes, 
which supplies much more varied and interesting matter than 
the usual reading books, which have to be read over and over 
again. (2) Providing notebooks in which they record each day 
(generally whilst the registers are being marked) any objects 
of interest they have seen during the previous twenty-four hours 
—birds, plants, fossils, or even observations on the weather. 
I have noticed a marked increase of intelligence in the children 
as a result of the above practice, and I have also been kept 
informed of many things which would otherwise have escaped 
my own observation. Amongst other things, I may add that a 
rat was seen carrying an egg in its mouth, not in the elaborate 
fashion described by one of your correspondents. I occasionally 
get curious local names. Has anyone, e.g., met with the name 
‘ Frank Heron,’ or is it a corruption of some other name 
wrongly pronounced or spelt ? ” 
Natural History by Advertisement.^ — Mr. E. A. Martin 
writes: — “ Messrs. Colman, of Norwich, are issuing four large 
natural history sheets, mounted on cards, to be hung on the 
walls of school rooms, institutes, &c. They are of course issued 
as a means of advertisement, but the advertisement of the mus- 
tard is so carefully veiled, and the sheets are likely to serve so 
useful a purpose, that I may perhaps refer to them in Nature 
Notes. The sheets illustrate the birds, eggs, flowers and 
butterflies and moths of Great Britain. They are well and 
judiciously coloured, and any Branch that deals with the 
instruction of children in natural history, would be well advised 
in applying for the series, the distribution of which no doubt 
Messrs. Colman are anxious to secure.” 
Fiction in Natural History. — Our esteemed French con- 
