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COLONEL GARDINER.

WITH the history of the eminent individual just named, many are familiar, yet a sketch of it may not be unacceptable to others. At a very early age, he determined on following a military life. The tears of his pious mother, whose judgment and affection he much valued, opposed his wishes; and to these were added the entreaties of his nearest friends, but he could not be turned from his purpose. At the age of fourteen, he had an ensign's commission in a Scottish regiment in the Dutch service; and two years after he received one from queen Anne.

"When in my youth, I loved to shed my blood, Both for my king and for my country's good; But in my age my joy it was to be

Soldier to Him who shed his blood for me."

As a Christian warrior he was found faithful. Constantly rising at four o'clock in the morning, he devoted two hours to the exercises of reading, meditation and prayer. If at any time he was obliged to leave his room earlier than usual, he rose an hour sooner and sometimes two. He also retired for an hour in the evening, and thus diligently aimed to be "in the fear of the Lord all the day long."

The death of his beloved mother was one of the greatest trials he was ever called to experience, but he bore it with In the battle of Ramillies, he was true resignation. He was united in wounded in the mouth by a musket ball; marriage to lady Frances Erskine, daughbut though some think he was the sub-ter of the earl of Buchan; the greatest ject of serious impressions, yet on his recovery he plunged into the folly and dissipation of the world. He proved, however, that "the way of transgressors is hard;" and often thought that the life of a brute was preferable to his own.

Unable to forget the entreaties and prayers of his mother, and condemned by his own conscience, he had many obstacles to surmount in his course of profligacy, which was terminated at length by his conversion to God, under very remarkable circumstances. He could now fully sympathize with that eminent man who directed the following inscription to be placed on his tomb:FEBRUARY, 1840.

imperfection in whose character, he said, was, "she valued and loved him more than he deserved." Of her, and his eldest daughter, he took what proved to be a final leave at Stirling Castle. On lady Gardiner being more than usually affected at their separation, he asked her the reason, and on her assigning the very natural cause of her distress, he replied, "We have an eternity to spend together." He was mortally wounded in the battle of Preston Pans; and soon after laid down together the weapons of his worldly and spiritual warfare.

An engraving of his residence, Bankton House, is placed at the head of this

E

article; his history is traced by a
master-hand in the memoir of him by
Dr. Doddridge. But enough has now
been said to show that "wisdom's ways"
alone "
are ways of pleasantness ;" that
piety may be displayed in scenes of
active life; that religious instruction
in early days may ultimately tend to the
production of lasting good, and that the
Christian is "the highest style of man."
War, it may be added, is attended by
incalculable evils; but there is a con-
flict, in which we desire every reader to
be engaged. It is that of the man who,
fearing God, knows no other fear:

Ask him, indeed, what trophies he has raised,
Or what achievements of immortal fame
He purposes, and he shall and ever-None.
His warfare is within. There unfatigued
His fervent spirit labours. There he fights,
And there obtains fresh triumphs o'er himself,
And never-withering wreaths, compared with

which

The laurels that a Cæsar reaps are weeds.

NOTES ON THE MONTH.

By a Naturalist.

FEBRUARY.

THE winter is not yet passed; the rains are not over and gone;" yet we cannot but perceive that a change is beginning to manifest itself over the face of nature. February is usually called a dreary month, a month of clouds, and mist, and heavy rain, when

"Driving sleets deform the day delightless;" nevertheless, it is a busy month to the gardener and the farmer; and full of interest to the naturalist, and him who walks through the world with his eyes open. The days have begun sensibly to lengthen; the sun has acquired some power, and now and then breaks forth, lighting up the scene with a gladsome, but transient glow of brightness. Let us avail ourselves of the welcome opportunity, and, though the lanes are miry, the " ways be foul," and the meadows soaked with water, boldly venture forth. He who would observe nature in all her moods, must take the rough with the smooth, nor shrink from trifling obstacles. Come then, for why should we delay ? See how busy the earthworm (Lumbricus terrestris) is on every side, its earthcasts cover the lawn and the meadow. Great is the utility of this animal; by its operations it loosens the soil, thereby rendering it more porous, and susceptible of the infiltration of water, so essential to the nutriment of plants. But this is

not all: the earthworm absolutely raises the surface of the soil, and that very rapidly, insomuch that stones and other objects, which cumber the ground, become in a few months (or if large, years) buried beneath an accumulation of rich mould, the nutrimen rejectum, of myriads of these beings, the effect of whose agency is to level and smooth, and fit the soil for herbage. Worms then are pasture makers. It is by their means that a stony, sterile field becomes a uniformly grass-covered mead; that the stones disappear beneath the turf, and that a light and porous surface is perpetually maintained. In the multitudes of these creatures, then, we see the wisdom of the Almighty, who has destined them, feeble ministers as they are, for the promotion, in a remote sense, of man's interest; for though he feeds not on the grasses of the meadow, his cattle pasture there, his herds and his flocks; and how far these, the pecunia* of the earth, are connected with his interests, we need not labour to explain.

But the worm has its enemies, its appointed enemies; and one is now most busily at work, we mean the mole. See how many fresh molehills cover the meadow,-last night's work, for the mole is a nocturnal miner. A talented naturalist observes, that the labours of the mole are not confined to the galleries, and passages, and vaults which it excavates; "but in lands, newly sown, the surface of which is consequently light and yielding, after moderate rain, which has. brought the earthworms to the surface, the mole follows them, and pursues its chase along the superficial layer of the soil, digging a shallow continuous trench, in which work it advances with great rapidity." These shallow trenches being only just beneath the surface, their course may be often traced by a slight elevation, the animal having arched up the roof of the winding gallery, by the pressure of its own body, as it forced its way through the yielding soil. "The district or domain to which an individual mole confines himself, may be termed its encampment. Within its limits, or at

*The Latin word pecunia, primarily an estate, secondarily money or property in general, is derived from pecus, sheep; these animals anciently

were the wealth of men. In Homer we read of a

cauldron being worth twenty sheep. See also the account of the riches of Job, and of the Patriarchs;

and how they were used (as by Abraham in the purchase of the well) as money, by which word we thing represented. now understand the representative, and not the

least in immediate communication with | been most probably on a visit to his store this district, all the labours of the animal of nuts, acorns, and beech mast, for a are pursued. It consists of a habitation meal. The squirrel does not pass the or fortress, from which extends the high winter in a state of hybernation, but clad road by which the animal reaches the in warm fur braves its severity. Inopposite extremity of the encampment, stinct-directed he accumulates various and of various galleries or excavations little magazines of food, snugly hidden, opening into this road, which it is con- lest the thievish jay should discover and tinually extending in search of food, pilfer his treasure. At this season they and which, in fact, constitute its hunting are his great, if not entire source of ground." The fortress is formed under dependence; and who that finds in some a large raised hillock. These animals chink or cranny, the store thus wisely seldom intrude upon each other's hunt- (so to speak) accumulated, would scatter ing ground; but should two meet in the it, and rob the Ariel of the woods of his same excavation, one must retreat, or a just possession ? fierce battle ensues, which proves fatal to the weaker of the combatants. In the mole the appetite of hunger amounts to frenzy, and hence, with the exception of about six hours' rest in the middle of the day, it is incessantly on the chase. Worms constitute its staple food, which it pursues, during the frosts of winter, to their deepest retreats; nevertheless, it also eats the larvæ of coleopterous insects; and even mice, birds, lizards, and frogs. But surely you are ready to say, Is it not in danger of being drowned, during the floods of February, and indeed of other months? Not at all. In addition to its excellences as a miner by trade, it is a most admirable swimmer; and for the act of swimming its hands and feet are as well adapted as for excavating. "Surprised in its encampment," says the writer referred to, "by the floods, it seeks its safety by this means; and, a friend of mine, residing at Waltham Abbey, assures me, that he has seen moles swimming very featly, when the marshes of that neighbourhood have been inundated. But it is not only when driven to it, as a means of escape from danger, that it employs this mode of travelling. It will not hesitate to cross a brook, or even a broad river, to change its hunting ground, or to emigrate from a district which has ceased to yield it sufficient nourishment; and occasionally it would appear to take the water merely for the purpose of enjoying the luxury of a bath."-Bell's Brit. Quad. The mole has his enemies, and man amongst the number. The molecatcher has already begun to set his traps.

Let us pass through the wood. The squirrel is very busy and alert; how nimbly he ascends the trunk of that fine beech tree; how soon he is hidden among the topmost branches. He has

The hybernating animals are begining to bestir themselves. The dormouse is roused by the fitful sunshine to peep forth and take a little food; for though it passes the severer months in a state of torpidity, it awakens when a warmer day than usual intervenes; and during the present month, a sunshiny day is almost sure to call it from its dormitory; but it will return to its repose when the sun begins to decline, and the air becomes again chilly and depressing. The hedgehog, however, sleeps more soundly, and will not yet appear; rolled up in a compact ball, and invested with moss and leaves, beneath the covert of some brake, or under the roots of some old hollow tree, it waits for the warmer months to call forth the "creeping things" on which it feeds, before its profound trance will pass away. The hedgehog stores up no food; indeed it cannot, from the very nature of its food, (slugs, snails, insects, lizards, etc.,) and therefore, were it to awake, it would awake to famish: there is therefore wisdom and mercy in the law which ordains its late hybernation.

Strange to say, the common bat (Vespertilio pipistrellus) occasionally appears on the wing, even during the present month; and still more frequently during March. This species is the latest and earliest on the wing of the British bats, having been seen alert and flying even as late as December. A warm sunshiny day is sure to rouse it. Its food consists of gnats, which the same warm sunshine also calls forth, and thus it awakes to food prepared as it were for its reception. The final retirement of this species of bat "does not depend," says Mr. Bell, "exclusively upon temperature; for although before the severe frosts set in, they continue to fly even when it is below the freezing point, they do not

again appear until the time above mentioned, (March, but often even earlier,) notwithstanding the thermometer may have often arisen considerably above fifty degrees Fahr. This peculiarity is easy of solution. The fondness of the animal for different species of gnats has been observed even from the earliest period, and from the diminutive size of the pipistrelle (common bat,) it is probable that these little insects constitute its principal food. These, and many other dipterous insects, after having disappeared during the ungenial fogs and rains of the close of the autumn, often make their appearance again in smaller numbers, on every fine warm day, until the severe cold of the depth of winter finally destroys the greater part of them. The same impulse of hunger equally accounts for the appearance of the pipistrelle in the daytime, at this period of the year; as it is only at that time that the temperature is sufficiently elevated to summon into temporary activity its insect food."

The feathered tribes are now in activity; the raven is preparing his nest, and so is the crow; and the rook is not behind them. How full of bustle and animation is the rookery! Some are bringing sticks and twigs, with which to repair their nests, which, thus patched up, form the cradle for many a successive generation; some are contending for the possession of a nest to which two parties lay claim; we suspect the law of might is the law of right with them. Some, too, are absolutely robbing their neighbours, despoiling their nests, for the sake of furnishing their own with little pains and labour. A rookery is a picture of human society, and presents, at this season, a scene of turmoil, squabbling, and misrule. In a little time, however, the various litigations among the contending parties will subside. "Rooks," says Gilbert White, are continually fighting and pulling each other's nests to pieces: these proceedings are inconsistent with living in such close community; and yet, if a pair offer to build on a single tree, the nest is plundered and demolished at once.' "Some unhappy pairs are not suffered to finish any nests till the rest have completed their building. As soon as they get a few sticks together, a party comes and demolishes the whole. As soon as rooks have finished their nests, the males begin to feed the females, and

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this is continued through the whole season of incubation."

The thrush is loud in song; clear, bold, and varied are his notes: nor is the blackbird silent. Listen to those two sharp notes, reiterated with harsh emphasis; there flits the bird that uttered them among the willows by the brook; it is the marsh titmouse, (Parus palustris,) one of our early breeders: it builds in the holes of pollard willows, and the stumps of trees near its favourite haunts; and its nest is made of moss, mixed with the fine soft down which clothes the seeds of the willow. During the winter this active little bird associates with others of its species in small families, these are now breaking up, for the pairing season is at hand.

There stands a heron in the flooded brook, immovable, with its neck bent, and drawn in between its shoulders; its beak ready to strike, and its eye intent upon the water, watching for some unwary fish that may come within its reach. Our approach has disturbed it; away it sails on its ample wings, to some more sequestered spot. During the winter these birds roam far and wide in search of open water; but at the latter end of this month the scattered flock draw gradually towards their heronry ; and numbers may be seen collected together, as if on a consultation previous to the great business of the spring. In some respects a heronry resembles a rookery; these birds building in company together on the highest trees; their nests are made of sticks lined with wool, or other soft materials, and are large and flat, and often in contact with each other on the same branch, or tree.

Our winter birds of passage, are now beginning to move northwards, files of wild geese may be seen high in the heavens; and many of the birds, which were driven from the inland parts of the country to the coast, are now beginning to return. Nevertheless, if severe weather comes on, they retrace their way. The severe February of 1838 was rendered remarkable from the number of wild swans, by which various parts of this kingdom were visited. In the Magazine of Natural History, for 1838, p. 333, is the following communication from a correspondent at Blackburn, Lancashire: "The present dreadfully severe weather has driven to the estuary of, and even high up the river Ribble, a flock of wild swans, originally twenty-seven in

and may be regarded as their harbinger. Here, too, is a film of gossamer, an index that some of the spiders are already beginning to throw out their floating lines,-silken streamers.

Vegetation has made rapid advances, and several plants and shrubs are in blossom. Of these we may count the barren strawberry, (Fragaria sterilis ;) the butcher's broom, (Ruscus aculeatus ;) the coltsfoot, (Tussilago farfara ;) the daffodil, the sweet violet, and the snowdrop. The filbert, and the willow, too, hang out their flowers; and the yew puts on a greener tint, and appears in blossom.

number. The capture of four of these | It is the brimstone butterfly, (Gonephas come within my own observation; | teryx rhamni,) which precedes its race, the first was shot upwards of twenty miles from the mouth of the river, on February 7. The second was shot near Walton-le-Dale, about two miles up the Ribble, above Preston; this being shot by a farmer, the Goth actually had it plucked and roasted! The third was shot near Clitheroe, still higher up the river. The fourth bird came into my possession, February 17, having been killed near the embouchure of the river two days before." During the same month, many specimens of wild swans were shot on the Thames, and in the neighbourhood of London, which we had an opportunity of seeing. It is remarkable, that in the same month, the year before, after a severe storm of wind, a stormy petrel (Thalassidroma pelagica) was picked up on Preston moor alive, but completely exhausted; it survived its capture two days, and would, most probably, have recovered; but was killed for the purpose of mounting. The occurrence of this oceanic bird, inland, is very rare; but sea gulls are often driven by the winds to a considerable distance from the shore.

Let us then inquire into some of the phenomena resulting from the renewed activity of vegetable life. One great result is the disengagement of oxygen, effected by the sap circulating in the leaves, when exposed to the action of light, and in the decomposition of the carbonic acid gas, brought to the leaves by the sap, or else obtained by absorption from the surrounding atmosphere. The disengagement of oxygen, and the retention of carbon, an essential ingredient in Many of our native birds pair this the altered sap-essential to the nutrition month, besides those already noticed; as and growth of plants; the reverse of the thrush, the missel thrush, the red what obtains in the aeration of the blood grouse, the partridge, the domestic of animals, to whom oxygen is the great pigeon; and towards its close, the yellow pabulum vitæ, is wonderful and interesthammer, the goldfinch, and the ring-ing. Plants, therefore, nourish animals dove, (Columba palumbus) the largest of the European wild pigeons.

in more ways than one. It is in the green substance of leaves, the lungs of During the present month, many of plants, that this chemical decomposition the reptile tribes will awake from their of carbonic acid is effected. "The rerepose to activity. The viper (V. berus) markable discovery," says Dr. Roget, crawls forth to enjoy the sunshine. The "that oxygen is exhaled from the leaves ditches resound with the hoarse deep of plants during the day-time, was made croak of the frog, and the masses of by the great founder of pneumatic cheeggs, or spawn which the female depo- mistry, Dr. Priestley: to Sennebier we sits may be observed in great abund- are indebted for the first observation ance. From those eggs spring a tadpole that the presence of carbonic acid is reprogeny; a truly aquatic race, with quired for the disengagement of oxygen branchiæ, or organs of respiration, adapt-in this process, and that the oxygen is ed to the fluid in which they as yet exclusively live; and with a rudder-like tail, their only organ of progressive motion. In a few weeks, however, the limbs will begin to be developed, the branchia will be obliterated, the lungs will expand, the tail vanish, and the metamorphosis will end by these little creatures abandoning the water, and betaking themselves to the moist meadows and fields, in quest of food.

See yonder a butterfly on the wing!

derived from the decomposition of the carbonic acid; and these latter facts have since been fully established by the researches of Mr. Woodhouse of Pennsylvania, and M. Theodore de Saussure and Mr. Palmer. They are proved in a very satisfactory manner by the following experiment of De Candolle. Two glass jars were inverted over the same waterbath; the one filled with carbonic acid gas, the other filled with water containing a sprig of mint; the jars communicating

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