JANUARY.

land, and other arctic lands, we cannot avoid feeling how much poetry is connected with these wanderers of the earth and air.

I have endeavoured to mark, in a tabular form, the arrivals and departures of this class of birds, in their respective months, in a more clear and complete manner than has hitherto been done.

No migratory birds arrive this month, if we except grosbeaks and silktails, which in this, as in the last, occasionally appear, in very severe weather, as well as flocks of Norway spinks. According to Gilbert White, large flocks of hen chaffinches likewise appear in winter, which are supposed to come from the Continent. This singular circumstance seems difficult of solution.

DEPARTURES.

Nomina.

English names. Go. Come.

Haunts.

Clangula glacialis. Pocher, long-tailed. Jan. 14 Dec. 20 Lakes and shores.

THE GARDEN.

Gardens are amongst the most delightful things which human art has prepared for our recreation and refreshment. To say nothing of the common-places, that a garden was first constructed by God himself,—that in the shades of a glorious garden our first parents were placed by him, that our Saviour delighted to walk in a garden, that in a garden he suffered his agony, and that in a garden he was buried; there are a thousand reasons why gardens should be highly valued, especially by those who are fond of the country. Lovers of nature cannot always stroll abroad to those beauties and delights which lie scattered far and wide; the physical impediments of time and space-the severities of winter, the dews, the hasty storms, and the strong heats of summer lie between them and their enjoyment, especially if they be of the delicate sex. But into a garden-a spot into which, by the magical power of science, taste, and adventurous enterprize, the sweetest and most beautiful vegetable productions, not only of our own country, but of the whole globe are collected, they may step at all hours, and at all seasons; yes, even through the hours of night,

when many glories of Nature are to be witnessed; her sweetest odours are poured out; her most impressive and balmy quiet is sent upon earth. There, fearless of any "pestilence.. that walks in darkness," the gentlest and most timid creature may tread the smooth path of the garden, and behold all the calm pageantry of the glittering host of stars, of moonlight and of clouds. The bowers of a good modern garden invite us from the fierce heat of noon to the most delicious of oratories, in dry summer eves, to the most charming place of social enjoyment. A garden, with all its accompaniments of bowers, secluded seats, shrubberies, and hidden walks, is a concentration of a thousand pleasant objects, and the field of a multitude of animating pursuits. The rarest beauties of the vegetable world are not only there congregated, heightened in the richness and splendour of their charms, but there many of them are actually created.

The feeble invalid and feebler age, they who cannot lay hold on Nature in her amplitude, though they may anxiously and intensely thirst to renew, on heath and mountain, the enchant

ments of past days, can there grasp a multitude The sedentary man,

of her delights at once.

Secluded but not buried, and with song

Cheering his days,

there finds the most congenial relaxation, the most restorative exercise ever at hand. The lover of all bright hues and graceful forms, of all delicate and spicy aromas, of curious processes and wonderful phenomena, of all that iş soothing to the mind, and pleasant to the vision and the taste, there walks in a fairy-land of his own creation. There the sun shines tempered by the coolness of whispering branches; the breeze blows softly, charged with fragrance, the dews fall to refresh and awaken sleeping odours, and birds bring from their wilder haunts their melodies. To the fair creature, who, like Eve, is a lover of flowers, what a perpetual source of affectionate interest, of hopes, and fears, and speculations, of delightful labours, cares, and watchings, is found in a garden! Poets have always delighted to describe their favourite heroines amid the amenities of gardens, as places peculiarly accordant with the grace and gentle nature of woman. How beau

tiful is that passing view which Chaucer gives us of Emilia, in Palemon and Arcite!

Emily ere day

Arose and dress'd herself in rich array;
Fresh as the month, and as the morning fair,
Adown her shoulders fell her length of hair;
A riband did the braided tresses bind,
The rest was loose and wantoned in the wind.
Aurora had but newly chased the night,
And purpled o'er the sky with blushing light,
When to the garden walk she took her way,
To sport and trip along in cool of day,
And offer maiden vows in honour of the May.
At every turn she made a little stand,
And thrust among the thorns her lily hand
To draw the rose; and every rose she drew
She shook its stalk, and brush'd away the dew;
Then party-colour flowers of white and red
She wove, to make a garland for her head;
This done, she sung and caroll'd out so clear,
Then men and angels might rejoice to hear.

But how much more beautiful is Milton's picture of our first mother, pursuing her pleasant labours in the first garden, issuing from her bower at Adam's call,

Awake! the morning shines, and the fresh field
Calls us; we lose the prime to mark how spring
Our tender plants, how blows the citron grove,
What drops the myrrh, and what the balmy reed,