COLOURED ILLUSTRATIONS.-II. ON THE WATER: MORNING. The life of water-fowl seems to us, more especially in sultry weather, about the most enjoyable that is given to the irresponsible animal creation. They find themselves at home in both elements, at least on if not exactly in the water and the land, returning at their free choice from the one to the other; some of them can also rise and take flight in the air. Among the various tenants of our Zoological Society's Gardens, none that we ever see look so contented, so easy, healthy, and happy. The duck, with her brood of ducklings, serenely navigating the placid shallows of a sequestered mere, in the first of two companion drawings by Mr. H. Arnold, has her lot cast in very pleasant places. Here grow the sedges, the tall reeds and rushes, the broad-bladed water-aloe, the floating water-lily, each harbouring a world of insects, to supply the birds, as well as the fishes, with abundance of food. Woe to the doomed tadpole, or swimming larva of some undeveloped fly, which chances to drift within reach of their greedy beaks at the hungry breakfast hour! Well it is for the swift dragonfly and the butterfly, that they, possessing the means of aerial locomotion, can escape the dangers which beset the surface of river and pool! There is peril here, as in the haunts of meaner insects, of worms, grubs, and caterpillars, amid the leaves of plants or burrowing in the soil of the field. All brute creatures, or nearly all, seem to live in a state of war upon each other; yet we doubt not that the sum total of animal pleasure is thereby augmented. Perhaps, after all, it is not such a terrible fate to be eaten. The worm, in any case, will have its revenge upon the bodies of the most highly organised races after death, without excepting imperial Man. OVER THE WATER: EVENING, Gallant sport for the kingfisher, darting with rapid strokes of his strong wings over the water this summer evening, and snatching his unwary prey, a minnow or gudgeon, as it rises to the dimpling surface, ignorant of the impending foe! This peaceful hour of closing day is exceedingly propitious to the capture of small aquatic game; and the kingfisher has as good a right to his supper as anybody else. His wife and children, or perhaps only his wife and her eggs, remain at home in a nest which he has made of fish-bones, in the forsaken hole of some dead-and-gone rat, about thirty yards up the river's bank. Good luck to him and his, for he is a fine, brave fellow! Indeed, we always like to catch a glimpse of him in our evening stroll beside the Avon, the Axe, or the Exe. THE QUEEN'S MOST HON. PRIVY COUNCIL. H.R.H. the Prince of Wales. H.R.H. the Duke of Edinburgh. Duke of Richmond and Gordon. Duke of Somerset. Duke of Beaufort. Duke of Northumberland. Earl of Shrewsbury and Talbot. Earl of Devon. Earl of Sandwich. Earl of Ilchester. Earl of Carnarvon. Earl of Cork and Orrery. Earl of Harrowby. Earl Granville. Earl of Kimberley. Earl Sydney. Earl of Northbrook. Viscount Stratford de Redcliffe. Lord Emly. Lord Hammond. Lord Gordon. Hon. Henry B. W. Brand. Hon. William F. Cowper-Temple. Hon. Edward Pleydell Bouverie. Hon. Charles Pelham Villiers. Hon. Sir Percy E. Herbert. Hon. Sir Henry G. Elliot. Hon. James A. Stuart-Wortley. Sir George Grey, Bart. Sir William G. Hayter, Bart. Sir David Dundas. Sir George H. Seymour. Sir Lawrence Peel. Sir Alexander J. E. Cockburn, Bart. Sir John McNeill. Sir Frederick Peel. Sir Charles Bowyer Adderley. Sir William Erle. Sir James W. Colvile. Sir Robert Peel, Bart. Sir Andrew Buchanan. Sir William Gibson Craig, Bart. Sir Richard T. Kindersley. Sir W. R. Seymour V. Fitzgerald. Sir Robert J. Phillimore. Sir Joseph Napier, Bart. Sir James Fergusson, Bart. Sir Colman M. O'Loghlen, Bart. Sir William M. James. Sir Barnes Peacock. Sir William Heathcote, Bart, Sir John Stuart. Sir H. Bartle E. Frere. Sir Michael H. Beach, Bart. Sir John B. Karsiake. Sir R. P. Amphlet. R. Assheton Cross. William Ewart Gladstone. Thomas Milner Gibson. Richard More O'Ferrall. Spencer Horatio Walpole. Joseph Warner Henley. Robert Adam C. N. Hamilton. William Beresford. John Parker. Edward Horsman. Robert Lowe. John Robert Mowbray. William Nathaniel Massey. Henry James Baillie. Thomas Edward Taylor. John Bright. Hugh C. E. Childers. Austin H. Layard. William Edward Baxter. E. H. Knatchbull-Hugessen. William Patrick Adam. Lyon Playfair. George AF. Cavendish Bentinck, John Gellibrand Hubbard. |