A landing net on a long light pole will be found very convenient for recovering dead birds. No rules are needed for killing rail, as they lie so close and fly so slowly that a mere bungler can scarce miss them, unless he either gets flurried or tumbles overboard. When dead he is to be roasted, underdone, like the snipe, served on a slice of crisp buttered toast, with no condiment save a little salt and his own gravy. If you are wise, gentle reader, you will lay his ghost to rest with red wine—Burgundy if you can get it, if not, with claret. For supper he is undeniable, and I confess that, for my own part, I more appreciate the pleasure of eating, than the sport of slaying him; and so peace to him for the present, of which he surely will enjoy but little after the twentieth of September, until the early frosts shall drive him to his asylums, in the far southern wilds and waters. * * * * * THE FINE ARTS. Twenty-Seventh Annual Exhibition of the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts.—Viewed in all its bearings and relations, we believe this to have been the most important exhibition of this excellent institution. Not that we think the present by any means the best collection of paintings we remember to have seen in these same rooms. We believe it is generally known that for some time past a considerable business has been done in the way of importing paintings, statues, etc., for purposes of speculation. Through the exertions of the individuals engaged in this traffic, scores of foreign pictures have been scattered over the country. With this business it is not our purpose to meddle. Undoubtedly these gentlemen possess the right to invest their money in whatever will yield the largest per centage, and we are glad to perceive that a fondness for art exists to such an extent as tempts shrewd speculators and financiers to enter into operations of this description. But, keeping in view the state of affairs induced by the exertions of these gentlemen, no surprise will exist in the mind of any one at the unparalleled interest created in the public mind by the announcement that the Directors of the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts, impelled by a laudable desire to patronize art and artists, had offered certain “prizes or sums of money,” to be competed for by artists all over the world. The mere announcement put public curiosity on the _qui vive_. Expectation was on tip-toe. At length, after protracted delay, on the 16th of May last, the Academy was thrown open to the public.