sugar_."

These are, indeed, romantic secrets. Spinning nets and cages with sugar
is another fine display of confectionery skill--we say nothing of the
nets and cages which our fair friends are sometimes spinning--for the
sugar compared with their bonds--are weak as the cords of the
Philistines.

* * * * *




THE NATURALIST.

* * * * *


ROOKS.


We glean the following interesting facts from the _Essex Herald_, as
they merit the record of a _Naturalist_.

"The voracious habits of the rook, and the vast increase of these birds
of late years in certain parts of Essex, has been productive of great
mischief, especially in the vicinity of Writtle and of Waltham. Since
February last, notwithstanding a vigilant watch, the rooks have stolen
sets of potatoes from a considerable breadth of ground at Widford Hall.
On the same farm, during the sowing of a field of 16 acres with peas,