SWAN
.—The swan, as the most majestic and distinguished of all water fowl, is honoured with royal protection: those who disturb their nests, destroy their eggs, or injure, wound, or cripple the swans, are liable to imprisonment for twelve months, and a fine at the pleasure of the King. The corporate body of the City of London, as CONSERVATORS of the River Thames, have an annual aquatic excursion to Staines, (which is the western extremity of their boundaries,) in the most pleasant and most plentiful season of the year, with colours flying, music playing, and all the appropriate parapharnalia of the first and most opulent city in the universe. All the swans upon the Thames, within their district, are under the protection of the Conservators; and this display of civic grandeur is perpetuated from one generation to another, by the appellation of "Swan-hopping day."