so handsomely lodged and treated. The curassows are the domestic birds of the farm-yards of Peru and Mexico; and which, in a wild state, are so common in the woods of Guiana, that a hungry traveller looks upon them as certain resource when ordinary provisions fail, for their flesh is white and excellent, and their disposition so accommodating that they will remain perfectly quiet on their perches in the trees whilst he helps himself to his mind and appetite. It may not be generally known that these birds may be bred with as much ease in England as our own poultry. Returning to the terrace we find, at the point of junction of the terrace walk and the carnivora terrace on the right, in a deep square pit, those amusing climbers, the cinnamon and brown bears. They are idle this afternoon, and not even a cake will tempt them to mount the tall pole. Their prenomen is derived from their handsome brown coats, in which, as well as in locality and in greater ferocity in their natural state, they differ from the American black bears, of which species they are considered to be a variety: specimens of the latter are also to be found in the gardens.

Descending by a circuitous path on the left of the terrace, commanding a charming little bit of scenery, with a lawn and pond in the foreground at the bottom, we find a large octagonal cage, occupied by the king vulture, a very beautiful bird, and as cruel and ferocious-looking as beautiful. In summer the macaws are also to be found about this spot, most splendid in their red and yellow-and red and blue plumage; and who, by their most un-bird-like tumult, seem desirous to show that there is some truth in the philosopher's idea of a kind of compensating principle in nature: it appears we must not expect the songs of the nightingale, the lark, or the blackbird from magnificently arrayed exteriors, or that the lastnamed birds, whilst enchanting our ears, should at the same time dazzle our eyes. The path, now running between the macaws' cage and the llama-house opposite, conducts us to the lawn rich with purple beech, and with its sparkling little piece of water, dotted over with aquatic birds-among which black swans and eider ducks are conspicuous-and with little raised nests or boxes. In the centre a fountain

"Shakes its loosening silver in the sun."

A beautiful and very familiar species of Coreopsis geese, from New Holland, deservedly attract much attention. They are numerous, and have been all bred from a single pair. These might be naturalised in our farm-yards, and their flesh is said, by some travellers, to be more delicate than that of the English bird. A wonderfully interesting collection of birds occupy the cages on the right of this piece of water; crowned cranes; blue crowned pigeons; enormous cassowaries, with beaks like helmets, which extend backwards right over their heads; storks, standing on one leg, each on its own granite pedestal, in solitary and most sculpturesque repose and dignity, &c. The

court-yard and pond in front, entirely covered by a magnificent tree, forming a perfectly horizontal canopy. Here they seem to grow fatter and fatter every day; already their cream-coloured bodies are so puffed up that the long beaks cannot but repose upon the breast beneath. Whistling ducks, sheldrakes, and garganey teal, are here also to be found. Close by are the ostriches and emus. These last are among the wonders of the animal creation-creatures with wings that cannot fly, birds with the habits and strength of limb of quadrupeds. The emus, for instance, kick out like a horse, and the blow is strong enough to break a limb. The family of emus includes also the ostrich, the cassowary, and the dodo, once thought to be fabulous, but now proved to have existed; though, it is to be feared, existing no longer.

We turn now to the Carnivora Terrace, where we pass in succession the most powerful and ferocious of the wild beasts of our globe. (Cut, No. 15.) The first cage contains pumas or panthers, often called lions. Mr. Kean's favourite animal was a puma, and a very interesting specimen, as showing the erroneousness of the received opinion that the puma was irreclaimable. No dog could be tamer or more docile than Mr. Kean's Tom, which it will be remembered was the gift of Lord Byron. Next are black leopards-then more pumas-black bears-and spotted leopards,-whose tastes, when opportunity is given for their development, seem to be in harmony with their appearance. A lady, Mrs. Bowdich, now Mrs. Lee, won the heart of one of these animals by lavender-water, which it was so extravagantly fond of, as to be trained into the habitual sheathing of its claws, by the mere punishment of the loss of this luxury when it did not. Isabella bears succeed; then the hideous striped and spotted hyenas from Africa. Some of the old stories have a touch of poetry about them; according to one, the hyæna was accustomed to imitate the language of men, in order to attract wandering shepherds, whom it then devoured.

Turning the corner at the end of the terrace, we find the opposite side is provided with an extra covering or roof of glass in front of the cages, for the more magnificent and less hardy animals there located. First comes the royal Bengal tiger; than which it is impossible to imagine a living organism combining at once more beauty, and strength, and ferocity. How it paces to and fro, seeking apparently whom it may devour. In striking contrast are the three lions in the next cage, all reposing in the most supreme dignity of form and character. The chetah, or hunting leopard, in another cage, must arrest every one's attention by the contrast between its long and high body, and absurdly small head. There is no getting rid of the impression that body and head have come together by some extraordinary accident. Tigresses, lions and lionesses together, jaguars, follow in due succession. We have spoken of the strength of the royal Bengal tiger, and may add that this is a common characteristic

of the feline tribe. Leaps of twenty feet or so are mere bagatelles with both the lion and the tiger; man is like a plaything in their grasp; the powerful Indian buffalo can be carried off by them without difficulty. No wonder, then, that the sound of their roar in their native forests inspires terror in the bravest man, as well as in the most timid beast.

At some distance beyond the termination of the viaduct, and in the same line, a piece of water attracts attention, even more by its own beauty than by the variety of its aquatic inhabitants. Small but luxuriantly-wooded islands are scattered about the centre, the banks are thickly fringed with reeds, and bordered by elegantly-flowering shrubs, suitable to the kind of scenery indicated; and altogether it is impossible to imagine a much happier existence than these waddling, and swimming, and diving rogues here enjoy-these Brent, and Canadian, and Chinese, and Egyptian, and laughing geese-these tufted, and crossbred pintail, and penguin ducks-these teal, and shovellers, and pochards. In his way, too, the polar bear, in the neighbourhood of the pond, is luxuriantly lodged; he has got his comfortable den, and his pool of water, where he may swim about, and fancy he is once more breasting the seas of the polar regions, swimming his thirty or forty miles at a time, as they have been seen in Barrow's Straits. It is true a seal now and then would perhaps make him more comfortable, of which animal he is the great tormentor; but Can't-be is the most persuasive of practical philosophers, and seldom fails in teaching resignation. The monkey-poles, close by, are as yet unoccupied, through the coldness of the season, so we pass on to the condor's cage. This bird's real size, which is among the largest of the vulture family, measuring occasionally no less than fourteen feet from tip to tip of wing, when outspread, is perfectly insignificant compared to its old repute, when it was esteemed to be the veritable roc of the 'Arabian Nights.' And that there was such a bird who could doubt, after seeing or reading of that famous "claw of the bird roc, who, as authors report, is able to trusse an elephant," which was in the famous museum of the Tradescants? there was no resisting the claw. Fortunately, however, the roc still keeps in his mysterious solitude, and the condor proves to be a very different bird; which is also fortunate, for as there is scarcely any killing him, but that, such as he is, he must remain till he pleases in his own good time to die, there is no saying what would become of the world had a race of immortal rocs taken possession of it. As an instance of this remarkable tenacity of life in the condor, we remember that Humboldt describes some Indians strangling one with a lasso, who afterwards hung it upon a tree, and pulled it forcibly by the feet for some time. They then took it down, removed the lasso, and the condor got up and walked about as though nothing particular had happened.

But what is this great pile of rock-work, almost big enough for a human habitation, covered with foliage, and surrounded by its own little but deep lake of water?

The tenant must be of sadly vagrant habits to desire to leave such a complete little estate, yet the wire-work over the whole seems to indicate as much. That is the otter's home, one of the great centres of attraction in the gardens at the animal's dinner-time, when live fish are thrown into the water, which he catches with astonishing skill and rapidity.

We have now reached a kind of central spot of the portion of the gardens, that lies on this side of the Park-road, and a charming little place it is, with walks branching off in different directions, each between its own high, green, and blooming banks, with lawns, and beds of flowers in the centre, a pretty-looking and elegantly furnished building for refreshment on one side, the monkey-house on another, the otter and other cages, just mentioned, on a third. The monkey-house has a wired enclosure, extending all along one side, for their out-door enjoyments in the summer. We must step into the house, to pay our respects to these most amusing of organized beings. For our part, we do not understand how it is physicians are so often puzzled by cases of hypochondria: why do they not send their patients here? Look at that beau, examining his nails with as much attention as if to have a fine hand were the end and aim of monkey existence. Another, after a series of gambols, for your especial benefit apparently as a stranger, stops suddenly, his tail circling over his head, and cocks his eye at you with the most irresistible effect. This little fellow here appears to be puzzled to know what we are doing with our note-book and pencil, so mounts quietly up the wires, till he can look down upon the paper. As to their gambols, a school broke up for the holidays seems but a faint imitation. Their power of locomotion is familiar to every one; but really the amazing distance to which some of these monkeys can throw themselves (for that word expresses best the character of many of their movements), scarcely appears less wonderful for the fiftieth than for the first time. Among the other striking features of the monkey-house that our space alone admits of our noticing, is the sonorous bark of one of the baboons, the human-like character of that cluster of faces of the bonnet monkeys, and the exceeding grace and prettiness of the diminutive marmozets. A variety of objects must here be passed summarily over,-such as the ponds for the American teal, ducks, &c.; the building containing the family of birds in which the destructive power has been developed to its highest extent, the vultures and eagles,-some of the latter, as the Brazilian Caracara eagles, are remarkably beautiful; the parrot-house, containing the finest living collection in the world of the most beautiful of all birds, macaws, cockatoos, parrakeets, which combine with the loveliest of known tints, great docility, imitative power, and attachment to those who are kind to them, in a state of domesticity; the aviary for small birds, a handsome-looking semicircular piece of architecture, where among weaver birds, and Paradise grackles, and rice-birds, and mocking-birds, a brilliant scarlet ibis especially attracts the eye. We

now cross the bridge over the mouth of the tunnel, and then pass on to the owls' cages, where, at this moment, three are sitting in one compartment, side by side, so grave, so solemn, and judge-like, as to provoke the remembrance of the old jest of their likeness to a bench of magistrates; thence to the dovecote. In this part we find the bison,-a formidable looking animal seen thus solitary and in captivity, but which must be indeed terrible when beheld almost covering, with their immense numbers, the savannahs of the remoter districts of North America; or as when Lewis and Clarke watched them, crossing a river in such multitudes, that, although the river was a mile broad, the herd stretched, as thick as they could swim together, from side to side.

Here there is another pond for geese, where the wild swans should not be passed without notice, not simply as natives of Great Britain, which have occupied in past times so much royal attention, but as the species which has in all probability given rise to the beautiful fable, so celebrated by our poets, of its dying amid the sounds of its own music. And here again, it seems, there is the slightest possible ground-work for the idea; its note, which resembles the word "hoop" uttered several times in succession, is said not to be unmusical heard from above, as the birds sweep along in their wedge-shaped array.

Having passed through the tunnel, by which the grounds on the opposite sides of the park-road are connected, we reach the secluded-looking spot, completely embosomed in lofty trees, and with steep banks sloping down towards the waters of the Regent's-canal, where we find the Museum, rich in materials illustrative of the general objects of the society; and the new Reptile House, which forms one of the most attractive features of the garden. Here are the sand lizards of Egypt, burrowing deep into the gravel of their cage. Here, too, is the Indian cobra, with the remarkable expanding membrane, which rises on each side of the head and neck when the animal is irritated. We shall never forget the proud fierce arch of that body, neck, head, and membrane, all so fixed and immoveable, as the cobra rose, forcibly disturbed for our examination. It looked like some evil spirit hovering over and enwrapping, as it were, its prey, notwithstanding the tiny form in which that spirit was embodied. In another cage we have Cleopatra's asp, which when disturbed from the sand moves sidelong in a most remarkable manner,

all the folds of the body advancing at the same time on the same level. Pythons, boa constrictors, puffadders, and rattlesnakes, help to tenant this house. A pretty collection of innocents certainly. How it makes one shudder at the idea of being left in the dark in such a place, and at the possibility of any of the cages opening. The rattlesnake offers a peculiarly interesting exhibition. You can see and hear the whole mystery relating to the rattle; this is at the end of the body or tail, and is formed of a few scales of a horny character, connected together by a membrane. When you have in any way excited the snake's indig. nation, you will see that rattle quivering with an almost inconceivable speed, and hear its loud note of indignation for some five minutes probably before the injured reptile can forget its wrongs, and sink back into its quiet sand at home.

We are now approaching the extremity of the gardens, where completely embosomed in the green wood, are various buildings scattered about, as that for the peccary sties, where is the collared peccary from South America, really a beautiful little pig, with slender delicate legs and feet, intelligent aspect, and particularly clean appearance. Here also are the Elephant House and the houses of the superintendent and head keeper; the former having one of its rooms devoted to the reception of a variety of small tender quadrupeds, as the flying opossum, the brown coati-mundi, the golden agouti, porcupine, Indian tigercat, jerboas, &c., &c. And, lastly, a remarkably-lofty building appears before us, with an enclosed yard on the left, where the trees, fenced to a most unusual height, and with a projecting guard at the top of each fence, seems to imply we have got among some creatures from the scene of Swift's geographical discoveries-that mysterious land of Brobdignagg, which not all British skill, and capital, and enterprise, have yet been able to find the way to. And when we do get within the building, and perceive it is the giraffe-house and park that we have been gazing on, it is difficult to resist the impression that these most beautiful and delicate, but, to the very eyes that behold them, almost incredibly tall creatures cannot belong to any part of our planet with which we have been hitherto familiar. There are now several here; males and females, some born in the gardens, and enjoying, we are happy to say, excellent health. There are some kangaroos from Australia

in the same house.