Illustrated Natural History for Young PeopleGeorge Routledge and Sons, 1882 - 229 pages |
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Africa America anglers animal appearance attack bait beak beautiful beetles bill bird bite body branches brown called caterpillar CETACEA claws coasts color common common lizard CORNCRAKE covered creature curious devouring dogs easily tamed eggs elephant elytra escape Europe exceedingly eyes feathers feeds feet fish fishermen five flesh four frequently frogs giraffe gorilla ground habits hair hare head hole hook hoopoe horns horse hunters hunting inches inhabits insects jaws killed known larva larvæ legs length Lepidoptera lives mole molluscs moth mouth native neck nest ostrich pectoral fins peculiar placed possess powerful prey principally pupa quadrupeds raven remarkable reptile resembling rivers seen seize sharp shell singular skin snail snake sometimes species spider Spider Monkeys spot star-fish surface swallows tail teeth TITMOUSE trees tusks usually WANDERING ALBATROSS weight whale wings wood young
Popular passages
Page 109 - But the Nightingale, another of my airy creatures, breathes such sweet loud music out of her little instrumental throat, that it might make mankind to think miracles are not ceased. He that at midnight, when the very labourer sleeps securely, should hear, as I have very often, the clear airs, the sweet descants, the natural rising and falling, the doubling and redoubling of her voice, might...
Page 20 - It consists, at times, of a low deep moaning, repeated five or six times, ending in faintly audible sighs : at other times he startles the forest with loud deep-toned solemn roars, repeated five or six times in quick succession, each increasing in loudness to the third or fourth, when his voice dies away in five or six low muffled sounds, very much resembling distant thunder.
Page 114 - He many times deceives the sportsman, and sends him in search of birds that perhaps are not within miles of him, but whose notes he exactly imitates ; even birds themselves are frequently imposed on by this admirable mimic, and are decoyed by the fancied calls of their mates, or dive with precipitation into the depth of thickets at the scream of what they suppose to be the Sparrow-hawk.
Page 86 - ... man to tread on the surface of the earth, the eagle to soar in the expanse of the skies, and the monkey and squirrel to inhabit the trees: still these may change their relative situations without feeling much inconvenience: but the sloth is doomed to spend his whole life in the trees; and, what is more extraordinary, not upon the branches, like the squirrel and the monkey, but under them. He moves suspended from the branch, he rests suspended from it, and he sleeps suspended from it.
Page 173 - But bite the pearch will, and that very boldly ; and as one has wittily observed, if there be twenty or forty in a hole, they may be at one standing all catched one after another, they being, as he says, like the wicked of the world, not afraid, though their fellows and companions perish in their sight.
Page 113 - ... seemingly beyond all limits. They consist of short expressions of two, three, or at the most five or six syllables ; generally interspersed with imitations, and all of them uttered with great emphasis and rapidity ; and continued, with undiminished ardor, for half an hour, or an hour, at a time. His expanded wings and tail, glistening with white, and the buoyant gayety of his action, arresting the eye, as his song most irresistibly does the ear.
Page 109 - ... Nightingale, another of my airy creatures, breathes such sweet loud music out of her little instrumental throat, that it might make mankind to think miracles are not ceased. He that at midnight, when the very labourer sleeps securely, should hear, as I have very often, the clear airs, the sweet descants, the natural rising and falling, the doubling and redoubling of her voice, might well be lifted above earth, and say, Lord, what music hast thou provided for the Saints in Heaven, when thou affordest...
Page 12 - The great difference between the kassar and the pappan in size would prove at once the distinction of the two species ; the kassar being a small slight animal, by no means formidable in his appearance, with hands and feet proportioned to the body, and they do not approach the gigantic extremities of the pappan either in size or power; and, in short, a moderately strong man would readily overpower one, when he would not stand the shadow of a chance with the pappan.
Page 20 - As a general rule, lions roar during the night ; their sighing moans commencing as the shades of evening envelop the forest, and continuing at intervals throughout the night. In distant and secluded regions, however, I have constantly heard them roaring loudly as late as nine and ten o'clock on a bright sunny morning. In hazy and rainy weather they are to be heard at every hour in the day, but their roar is subdued.