Well I know thy penetration
Many a stain and blot will see,
In the languid long narration,
Of my sylvan errantry.
For the pen too oft was weary,
In the wandering writer's hand,
As he roved through deep and dreary
Forests, in a distant land.
Show thy mercy, gentle reader,
Let him not entreat in vain;
It will be his strength's best feeder,
Should he ever go again.
And who knows, how soon complaining
Of a cold and wifeless home,
He may leave it, and again in
Equatorial regions roam.
C.W.
[ON PRESERVING BIRDS FOR CABINETS OF NATURAL HISTORY]
Were you to pay as much attention to birds as the sculptor does to the human frame, you would immediately see, on entering a museum, that the specimens are not well done.
This remark will not be thought severe when you reflect that that which once was a bird has probably been stretched, stuffed, stiffened and wired by the hand of a common clown. Consider, likewise, how the plumage must have been disordered by too much stretching or drying, and perhaps sullied, or at least deranged, by the pressure of a coarse and heavy hand--plumage which, ere life had fled from within it, was accustomed to be touched by nothing rougher than the dew of heaven and the pure and gentle breath of air.
In dissecting, three things are necessary to ensure success: viz. a penknife, a hand not coarse or clumsy, and practice. The first will furnish you with the means; the second will enable you to dissect; and the third cause you to dissect well. These may be called the mere mechanical requisites.