the stragglers gathered into a narrower space; and then, the whole body, forming themselves into a close compact phalanx, with the greatest celerity, and with the ascending motion of the skylark, mounted perpendicularly into the higher regions of the air! The time was three o'clock, on a bright sunny afternoon of the first day of October; and, the atmosphere being very clear, the swallows were traced in their ascension to an immense height, and till, finally, they were lost to the eye. The wind was in the north-east, and the moon wanted only three days of her full. The gentleman thought, that the object of the swallows, in rising at once to so great a height, was to throw themselves into a stratum of air which, to their instinctive knowledge, was then running to the southward*. Other and earlier relations have been given, of the gathering of large flocks of swallows upon the sea-coasts, in evident preparation for departure, and upon evenings which promised a clear moonlight night+; but no observer, till the present instance, is recorded as having been so fortunate as to witness the moment of their actual disappearance in the skies! That, after days of preparation, the swallows always suddenly disappear completely, is certain; and it seems equally so, that they prefer to travel upon moonlight nights.

The question of the migration of birds, and, still more, the occasional departures from their habits, in this, and in other particulars, led, irresistibly, once more, to that of the sagacity of animals, for which, and for the consequent suppression of much of the

* Letter of the Rev. C. Trelawny Collins, Literary Gazette, October 26, 1833.

↑ See White's Natural History of Selborne, &c. &c.

doctrine of instincts, Mr. Paulett, as the reader knows, was a considerable stickler. He admitted, however, upon this occasion, that animals, under the circumstances of their accidental situation, were often guilty of such errors as might fairly expose them, especially at first sight, to the common imputation of having no more than a blind instinct for their guide; but this, he still contended, was only when they were put out of their way by the intervention of works of human art, for mastering of which they were naturally unprepared, either by their want of experience, or by the more unconquerable difficulties of their bodily conformation. Under the former head, he allowed, that amid all which could be said for the sagacity of the horse, it was a mortifying example of the contrary, that one of those noble animals, being in a stable of which the door was a-jar, put forward his head between the door and the jamb, and finding the door still close upon his neck, in this situation took fright, and pulled his head so constantly and so violently backward, as to kill himself by strangulation; while, if he had only walked forward but a step or two, the door would have given him not the slightest resistance, but suffered him freely to leave the stable!

At this admission of Mr. Paulett, Mr. Hartley was ready with a whimsical story of the instinctive industry of a young tame beaver, which he had seen at the house of a family residing upon the banks of the river Kennebec, in North America. The little animal was so far weaned from his wild habits, and so far accustomed to those of his human master and associates, that he was suffered to frequent the river at his pleasure, coming out, and returning home, when called upon to be fed or housed. But he was lodged in a

sort of out-building, or appendage to the kitchen, where, among a very few articles of furniture, one was a slight wooden chair. Upon occasion of heavy rains, the beavers have always reason to fear, that the waters of the lakes or rivers which they confine with their extended dams, will rise, and break through these latter, in some or other of their weaker or more assaulted parts, a mischief which it behoves them to lose the least possible time in repairing. With this foresight, in the midst of rains of such a description, they prepare branches and trunks of trees, by cutting them into lengths, and laying them ready for use, when either an accident shall become palpable from its effects, or find detection upon minute survey. Upon this service, too, they early employ their young, teaching them what is to be done, and scolding and beating them if they are negligent or awkward. Now, it happened one night, after the young beaver had been shut into his out-house, that there fell a heavy rain, the noise of which would necessarily be loud upon the wooden shingles of its roof. In the morning, all was fair again, and the door of the out-house was opened for family use, and to set the young beaver at his liberty. But behold, the thoughtful and industrious little creature, having heard the sound of the falling rain, had remembered what might be needful for the beaver-dams; and, for lack of growing timber in his night's lodging-place, had made no ceremony with the wooden chair, but, with his sharp and powerful teeth, diligently cut it all to pieces; the whole in convenient lengths for use and carriage!"

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"You thoroughly believe, sir," said Miss Wainfleet, the truth of that story?"

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'I was told it," answered Mr. Hartley," in the

house where the event was said to have happened, and by the owner of the house and beaver. But besides all this, the story, though whimsical from the domestic circumstances surrounding it, is scarcely a remarkable story, in relation to what is common among beavers. The Indians, from the marvellous appearances of reason which their habits display, insist, either jestingly or in earnest, that they are a race of creatures who were originally men, but who have been lowered into beavers for their sins!"

"They are extraordinary creatures, certainly," said Miss Wainfleet.

"All their habits," continued Mr. Hartley, 66 are marked with the show of reason, but none more so than those which concern those articles of their first necessity, their dams. They build them exactly upon the same principle of security with our own; that is, sloping with the current; and the activity and skill with which they proceed to a prudential survey after any rise or violence of the waters, is one of the most striking of their displays, to those who have an opportunity of witnessing them. They form them of wooden piles, and of cross and intervening sticks and timbers, and make their thickness of an embankment of earth or mud, which they fetch up from the bottom, and dispose with those natural trowels, their flat and skinny tails. But the skill and foresight with which they fell the trees (some of them of respectable girth), for these purposes, and for the building of their houses, are not the least of their surprising peculiarities. In every case, they wish to have the tree as near the water as possible, both for use and carriage; but, to that end, not only they find, if practicable, suitable trees at short distances from the edge of the water, but they con

sider, also, the difference of space arising from a tree's falling toward the water, or away from it. Upon this account, like any human workman, they begin the cutting of the trunk upon the side opposite to the water, and this rule they inculcate upon their young, who, thoughtless or inexperienced, however, not unfrequently neglect it. When this happens, they beat, or snarl, or snap, at the heedless youths, who, perhaps, have blundered through playing instead of working, and thus forgot their lesson; and, if the tree is so far bitten through, that, if finished in the felling, it could only fall in the contrary direction to that of the water, they put an end to the operation, and go to another tree. On the contrary, if a tree is properly felled, then, as soon as it reaches the earth or water, a competent number of beavers assemble about it, nipping off its branches, and reducing these and its whole trunk into the customary lengths. It is asserted that trees, partially cut through near their roots, and which have been abandoned by the elder beavers, because of the error of the younger, in cutting upon the wrong side, are of no uncommon occurrence upon any of the beaver-grounds."

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The old beavers seem to be very severe with the poor young ones," said Richard?

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Only when they neglect their duty," returned Mr. Hartley," or when they heedlessly forget their lesson. At other times, they are as playful with them as cats are with their kittens. The difference is, that kittens have nothing to perform, except to catch what they want to eat, and to wash their hands and faces; but young beavers must do all this, and also attend to wood-cutting and building, and laying up stores of food; the two former cares for the safety of their fathers' house, and