DIGITISED MANUSCRIPTS

door, in which she fastens her little claws, and by pressing on it with all her weight endeavours to defend her home against the invader. Natural history teems with objects of a higher order than the spider, all of which are equally familiar, and many more engaging; but there is perhaps no species whose habits present more sin- gular contrasts. Let us brush away the contami- nating cobweb, and consign to a decent burial in | the dust-bin the skeletons of the murdered flies, but before we destroy the arch offender, the spider, let us sympathise with that little creature in whose heart, despite her external ugliness, maternal love throbs so wisely and so well. The gist of these observations on the spider was to show that, even in its lowest forms, natural history can be studied in an easy, desultory manner. There is hardly a quadruped, a bird, or an insect, however humble it may be, whose habits are not interesting. Watch the fox or the weasel, the stork or the swallow, the bee or the ant, and you will be thoroughly repaid for your trouble. But natural history is far from being the only subject—indeed, it is but a very secondary one— on which we often make desultory remarks. The most ordinary manifestations of nature, if intelli- gently observed, will lead to a profitable study. The appearance of a rainbow may awaken your