sees her at a distance,
  As stiff as starch, and looked as dead as any thing in existence;
  All scorched and grimed, and more than that, I sees the copper slap
  Right on her head, for all the world like a percussion copper cap. 
  Well, I crooks her little fingers, and crumps them well up together,
  As humanity pints out, and burnt her nostrums with a feather;
  But for all as I can do, to restore her to her mortality,
  She never gives a sign of a return to sensuality. 
  Thinks I, well there she lies, as dead as my own late departed mother,
  Well, she’ll wash no more in this world, whatever she does in t’other. 
  So I gives myself to scramble up the linens for a minute,
  Lawk, sich a shirt! thinks I, it’s well my master wasn’t in it;
  Oh!  I never, never, never, never, never, see a sight so shockin;
  Here lays a leg, and there a leg—­I mean, you know, a stockin—­
  Bodies all slit and torn to rags, and many a tattered skirt,
  And arms burnt off and sides and backs all scotched and black with dirt;
  But as nobody was in ’em—­none but—­nobody was hurt! 
  Well, there I am, a scrambling up the things, all in a lump. 
  When, mercy on us! such a groan as makes my heart to jump. 
  And there she is, a-lying with a crazy sort of eye,
  A staring at the wash-house roof, laid open to the sky: 
  Then she beckons with a finger, and so down to her I reaches,
  And puts my ear agin her mouth to hear her dying speeches,
  For, poor soul! she has a husband and young orphans, as I knew;
  Well, Ma’am, you won’t believe it, but it’s Gospel fact and true,
  But these words is all she whispered—­’Why, where is the powder blew’”

* * * * *

THE NATURALIST.

* * * * *

MODE OF DESTROYING EAGLES.

In those parts of the Highlands of Scotland where eagles are numerous, and where they commit great ravages among the young lambs, the following methods are used for destroying them:—­When the nest happens to be in a place situated in the direction of a perpendicular from the edge of a cliff above, a bundle of dry heath or grass inclosing a burning peat is let down into it.  In other cases, a person is let down by means of a rope, which is held above by four or five men, and contrives to destroy the eggs or young.  The person who thus descends takes a large stick with him, to beat off or intimidate the old eagles.  The latter, however, always keep at a respectable distance, for powerful as they are, they possess little of the courage which has in all ages been attributed to them, being in this respect much inferior to the domestic cock, the raven, the sea-swallow, and a hundred other birds.  Sometimes eagles have their nests in places accessible without a rope, and instances are known of persons frequenting these nests, for