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me, assuredly these two birds should at this moment have formed a part and par¬ 
cel of my domestic establishment, and you, Mr. Editor, might have haply been gra¬ 
tified with a more minute detail of the habits of this beautiful portion of the fea¬ 
thered creation. 
Storks, (Ciconia). Who that has traversed Holland, Belgium, &c., has 
has not exclaimed, as they first caught sight of these birds, “ Look at the Storks !” 
as one or two, statue-like, motionless as marble, balanced on a single slender leg, 
presented themselves to view, perched on the summit of a picturesque chimney top, 
like a grotesque colume whose capital was an overhanging bush of thorns and 
twigs. There they stand, with the addition, if later in the season, of some two, 
three, or four queer-looking, puffy, amorphous-looking things by them, which, but 
for projecting beaks ever and anon gaping and shutting with a sort of clacking 
sound, might be taken for an accumulation of cotton fluffs. Should only one of 
these immoveable sentinels be on its post, the spectator will do well to continue on 
the watch ; for in a very few minutes his attention will be drawn to the arrival of 
a partner in the nursery proceedings of the chimney top, slowly and gracefully 
gliding through the air, and taking position within neck’s reach of the puff-bodied 
offspring. Pausing for a moment, the fresh comer’s neck is stretched forth, and the 
head bent at a right angle, so as to place the beak in a perpendicular position between 
the mandibles of one of the expectant candidates for the produce of the parental 
craw. Another moment’s pause, and then the perpendicular beak, opening with 
a sort of spasmodic jerk, disgorges the result of its forage in their fens and 
marshes, with unerring aim, down the throat of the recipient young one, which, 
with quivering extacy, gulps down the semi-digested mass of frogs, minnows, or 
other gelatinous materials provided for the repast; which being finished, all the 
parties concerned resume, for a time, their motionless and noiseless attitude. They 
look the pictures of meditation ; and who shall say that those grave heads are not 
dwelling on subjects surpassing man’s understanding ? There is one who has 
given them a power of thought and discrimination unpossessed and unintelligible 
to us, by which, with a truth which sets the skill of the most experienced navigator 
at defiance, the Stork learneth its appointed time, and when and how to wend its 
way to other regions destined to be its residence for the remainder of the year. 
Were these feathered philosophers allowed utterance but for an hour, how much 
might they disclose of the instinctive machinery whereby the Creator provides for 
the well-being of all his living works ! and with what admiration should we be 
made partakers of this additional development of the expansive agency of Omni¬ 
potence ! 
I shall conclude my few ornithological remarks by alluding to the small 
number of birds, generally speaking, usually met with on the continent. These 
observations have been forced upon me repeatedly in the many excursions I have, 
at various times, made in all directions. Magpies, Jays, and even Crows, are, in 
