This separate and single genus of birds is seldom seen amongst the numerous descriptions of wild fowl, which, in the winter seasons, wing their flight to our marshes. The most striking part of the Oyster-catcher is its bill, the colour of which is scarlet, measuring in length nearly four inches, wide at the nostrils, and grooved beyond them nearly half its length: thence to the tip it is vertically compressed on the sides, and ends obtusely. With this instrument, which in its shape and structure is peculiar to this bird, it easily disengages the limpets from the rocks, and plucks out the oysters from their half-opened shells, on which it feeds, as well as on other shell-fish, sea-worms, and insects.
W.G.C.
BUTTERFLIES.
The splendid appearance of the plumage of tropical birds is not superior to what the curious observer may discover in a variety of Lepidóptera; and those many-coloured eyes, which deck so gorgeously the peacock's tail, are imitated with success in Vanéssa Io, one of our most common butterflies. "See," exclaims the illustrious Linnaeus, "the large, elegant, painted wings of the butterfly, four in number, covered with small imbricated scales; with these it sustains itself in the air the whole day, rivalling the flight of birds, and the brilliancy of the peacock. Consider this insect through the wonderful progress of its life, how different is the first period of its being from the second, and both from the parent insect. Its changes are an inexplicable enigma to us: we see a green caterpillar, furnished with sixteen feet, creeping, hairy, and feeding upon the leaves of a plant; this is changed into chrysalis, smooth, of a golden lustre, hanging suspended to a fixed point, without feet, and subsisting without food; this insect again undergoes another transformation, acquires wings and six feet, and becomes a variegated white butterfly, living by suction upon the honey of plants. What has nature produced more worthy of our admiration? Such an animal coming upon the stage of the world, and playing its part there under so many different masks! In the egg of the Papilio, the epidermis or external integument falling off, a caterpillar is disclosed; the second epidermis drying, and being detached, it is a chrysalis; and the third, a butterfly. It should seem that the ancients were so struck with the transformations of the butterfly, and its revival from a seeming temporary death, as to have considered it an emblem of the soul, the Greek word psyche signifying both the soul and a butterfly. This is also confirmed by their allegorical sculptures, in which the butterfly occurs as an emblem of immortality." Swammerdam, speaking of the metamorphosis of insects, uses these strong words: "This process is formed in so remarkable a manner in butterflies, that we see therein the resurrection painted before our eyes, and exemplified so as to be examined by our hands." "There is no one," says Paley, "who does not possess some particular train of thought, to which the mind naturally directs itself, when left entirely to its own operations. It is certain too, that the choice of this train of thinking may be directed to different ends, and may appear to be more or less judiciously fixed, but in a moral view, if one train of thinking be more desirable than another, it is that which regards phenomena of nature with a constant reference to a supreme intelligent Author. The works of nature want only to be contemplated. In every portion of them which we can decry, we find attention bestowed upon the minuter objects. Every organized natural body, in the provisions which it contains for its sustentation and propagation, testifies a care, on the part of the Creator, expressly directed to these purposes. We are on all sides surrounded by bodies wonderfully curious, and no less wonderfully diversified." Trifling, therefore, and, perhaps, contemptible, as to the unthinking may seem the study of a butterfly, yet, when we consider the art and mechanism displayed in so minute a structure, the fluids circulating in vessels so small as almost to escape the sight, the beauty of the wings and covering, and the manner in which each part is adapted for its peculiar functions, we cannot but be struck with wonder and admiration, and must feel convinced that the maker of all has bestowed equal skill in every class of animated beings; and also allow with Paley, that "the production of beauty was as much in the Creator's mind in painting a butterfly, as in giving symmetry to the human form."
SPIRIT OF THE PUBLIC JOURNALS.
LADY MORGAN'S EGOTISM.
We know, and posterity will say the same, that there was never such a paragon as her ladyship; that her house in Kildare-street, Dublin, will be to future ages, what Shakspeare's house in Henley-street, Stratford-upon-Avon, is now; that pilgrims from all corners of the civilized globe will pay their devotions at her shrine; and that the name of Morgan will be remembered long after the language in which she has immortalized it has ceased to be a living tongue. WE are not the persons to deny this; for WE are but too proud of being able to call ourselves her contemporary; but we do dislike (and her ladyship will, forgive us for saying so)—we do dislike the seeming vanity of proclaiming this herself. She is a very great woman; an extraordinary woman; an Irish prodigy; popes and emperors have trembled before her; all Europe, all Asia, all America, from the St. Lawrence to the Gulf of Mexico, ring with her praises; there never has been such "a jewel of a woman," as her own countrymen would say. She knows this, and we know it; and "our husband" knows it; every body knows it; then why need she tell us so a hundred times over in her "Book of the Boudoir?"