The river Ohio is here a quarter of a mile wide, and, as there is no bridge, the traffic into Kentucky is accommodated with steam ferry boats.  Newport and Covington opposite, are pretty objects to look at from this side, but will not bear a nearer inspection. Big Bone Lick, where abundance of Mammoth bones have been discovered, is not far hence.  Mr. Bullock of the London Museum is here, and has at the Lick discovered many rare specimens of bones, amongst which is a mammoth’s head, with evidence of its having been furnished with a trunk, and of course having been an elephant of immense size.  He has also found hoofs of horses with their bones in a fossil state, proving that the horse has been indigenous.  The horses in this town being a mixture from those of South America, where they are wild—­are of various colours.  Some are brown and white, like pointer dogs, others are spotted like Danish dogs, and some with curled hair.  I saw one which was white as far us the fore-quarter, and the rest sorel.

An eye-witness has just related to me the following, which lately occured in New Harmony: 

A snake about two feet long, was seen to enter the hole inhabited by a crawfish,[2] from which he soon retreated, followed by the rightful tenant, who stopped in defensive attitude at the mouth of his habitation, raising his claws in defiance.  The snake turned quickly round, and seized the head of the crawfish, as if to swallow him; but the crawfish soon put an end to the conflict by clasping the snake’s neck with his claws, and severing the head completely from his body.  This may appear marvellous; but Audubon tells a story of a rattle-snake chasing and over-taking a squirrel, which folks in America doubt.

    [2] Is not this a species of land-crab?—­ED. M.

* * * * *

SPIRIT OF DISCOVERY.

* * * * *

POTTERY.[3]

(CONTINUED FROM PAGE 284.)

CHINA.

The name China, by which the ware that I am about to describe is known in England, shows sufficiently the country from which we have received it.  The term porcelain, which is applied to it on the continent of Europe, is Italian; porcellana being in that language the name of those univalve shells forming the genus cypraea of the conchologist, which have a high arched back like that of the hog (porco, Ital.), and are remarkable for the white, smooth, vitreous glossiness of the surface about the mouth of the shell, and sometimes, as in the common cowry (Cypraea moneta), over the whole surface.

    [3] By Mr. A. Aikin, in Trans.  Soc.  Arts.