Aug. 7—Many people are doubting Thomases fon the subject of birds and I'am often asked how it is that 2o many rare specimens cross my path, or how it happens that birds T want to study build their nests in-my garden, "Can you expect such coincidences to continue?" says the modern counterpart of the doubting Saint—Lean only reply that as regards the rare birds a case of "he that has eyes to see let him see;" and that nesting birds are easily explained cly the fact thet T put out suitable food and encourage them to build just where I want them. Something which certainly looked like a coin= el dence happened when T was studying at the British Museum in London: q black redstart, seldom if ever seen in the great City, chose th Museum grounds as its resting place and actually perched on the windows ill of the bird-galleries, Where it was immediately recognized, "Peshaps scores of these birds have settled in the gardens of London dwellings and have been seen but hot identified: T can well imagine Liza (a eyed woman) calling out to her husband, there ain't "arf a' funny-lookin' sparrer in ove yard": to which Bill would reply, "Shurr-up, imme my beer" and so on through all, grades Of society. And so Ido not regard the following fas a coincidence. Yesterday a friend asked me to Identity a thrush—"brownish-grey, with distinct, patch of white round the eyes and checks." "As there ig no such thrush 1 failed to help him: but this morning I saw Just such a Bird in my garden and immediately recognized grey stating (a stray from a migrating. fock) by ts wadding ed galt (walking and not hopping and running asa thrush would). But there is no real coincidence in this; for such birds, though rare in these parts, must come through occasionally and I was, quite uncon sciously searching for a thrush-sized bird with 2 white face-patch, And thus the problem was quickly solved, 10th August—Among other creatures created to amict the Just we have in Weihaiwet a kind of wasp with a body ko an ordinary hornet which has just done six months on a Hay diet Htvoan insert its skinny body through smallest cracks and has been known to build {is elreular nest of paper-like cells inside the box of an electric light switch: another nest was built' beneath a tile forming part of a home-made surface drain—and when the gardener went (o effect repairs he was severely stung on face and head: 30 these insects are not popular members of our household. We also have a brand of horse fy, grey to dull bul in colour, which gets tired of browsing on ponies and follows me into the hills where it inserts its proboscis into the back of my calversa, most painful procedure: I met one of these when walking to-day. It sat on a rock in front of and seemed 16 survey me as if choosing the fuiclest portion to bite. 1 was just preparing {o deliver a fatal blow, when there was sound like the zooming of an. aeroplane passing over my shoulder... as with incredible swift ne tone of those skinny hornet-wasps crashed on to the horse-fly and grasped it. A. battle royal ensued beneath my eyes as the two rolled over in their death-struggle, like two performers in fan all-in wrestling match: finally the wasp got fu a fatal sting, and just as T was hoping that also, might have received a fatal wound (for it lay quite still for some moments) it rose in the air with its prey and flew off across the valley. T'was left wondering whether the of a horse-fly would count as a carbohydrate or '2 protein... for T feel sure this unusual food must have something to do with a slimming diet!
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.