THE GREEN LINNET. BENEATH these fruit-tree boughs, that shed In this sequester'd nook how sweet And birds and flowers once more to greet, One have I mark'd, the happiest guest Hail to thee, far above the rest In joy of voice and pinion, Dost lead the revels of the May, While birds, and butterflies, and flowers A life, a presence like the air, Thyself thy own enjoyment; Upon yon tuft of hazel trees, Behold him perch'd in ecstacies, There where the flutter of his wings My sight he dazzles, half deceives, As if by that exulting strain, He mock'd and treated with disdain The voiceless form he chose to feign, While fluttering in the bushes. WORDSWORTH. INSTRUCTION FROM ANIMATED NATURE. FAR as Creation's ample range extends, Who taught the nations of the field and wood, To shun their poison, and to chuse their food! Prescient, the tides or tempests to withstand, And creature link'd to creature, man to man. way Thus then to Man the voice of Nature spake— Go, from the creatures thy instructions take : ?* *Drayton, in the following lines, entertains similar ideas to these expressed by Pope, in his Essay on Man :— The Hern, by soaring shows tempestuous showers, By whose clear voice sweet musick first was found, Covering with moss the dead's unclosed eye, The little Robinet teacheth charity. The old Poem, The Owl, published in 1593, from which these lines are taken, is written after the plan of Homer's Battle of the Frogs and Mice, or Virgil's Gnat;- probably from these models Mr. Roscoe and Miss Fanshaw took the idea of composing those amusing pieces, entitled the Butterfly's Ball, and the Peacock at Home. + The timber, next the ground. Learn from the birds what food the thickets yield; Spread the thin oar, and catch the driving gale. POPE. It has been supposed that man derived the first hints of mechanical contrivance from the lower animals. Although such an opinion is very doubtful, since, in the first ages of the world, his necessities must have required and impelled him to inventions of this kind, before he could observe with sufficiently close attention the habits of other creatures; it is certain that in later times, Science has been indebted to the works of Nature for many valuable suggestions. In support of this opinion, we may state, that the eminent engineer, Mr. Brunel, is said to have taken the idea of his new plan of tunneling, (viz. by the frame-work or shield, as used under the Thames,) from the operation of the Teredo, a testaceous worm, which is covered with a cylindrical shell, and which bores through the hardest timber. Hence, Linnæus called it calamitas navium. The accidental sight of the trunk of an old Oak, which had been sawn across, suggested to Mr. Smeaton the idea of dove-tailing each course of masonry in the Eddystone Light-house. The same happy observation of the wisdom displayed in the works of Nature, led Mr. Watt to deduce the construction of the flexible water-main, from the mechanism of the Lobster's tail. From a close consideration of the curious structure of the Eye, Mr. Dollond contrived his achromatic telescope; and from a minute inspection of the Horse's Hoof, Mr. B. Clarke constructed an expanding shoe, by which the elasticity of the foot is preserved, and lameness prevented. Many other instances might be mentioned, where mechanical contrivances have been suggested from the consideration of Animated Nature. INSECTS. OBSERVE the Insect race, ordain'd to keep At length assur'd, they catch the favouring gale, MRS. BARBAuld. The number of Insects distributed over the surface of the globe, Mr. Kirby estimates to be 400,000 species; and Mr. M'Leay says, that 100,000 are to be found in our cabinets. In the Systematic Catalogue of Mr. Stephens, (1827,) 10,000 British insects are enumerated, and of these upwards of 4,000 belong to the Class, Lepidoptera.-It has also been calculated, that the number of plants, supposed to exist, is about 44,000 species, of which 38,000 have been described. Mr. Loudon, in his valuable Encyclopædia of Plants, has published a description of 16,712 indigenous, cultivated, or exotic plants, which are now found, or have been introduced, into this country. The native plants of Great Britain, (ex |