_Fiendish Little Boy (to elderly gentleman, who has come a cropper for the fourth time in a hundred yards)._ "'Ere I say, guv'nor, you're fair wallerin' in it this mornin'! H'anyone 'ud think as you'd bin hordered it by your medical man!!!"] * * * * * [Illustration: OPEN TO DOUBT _Ostler (dubiously, to 'Arry, who is trying to mount on the wrong side)._ "Beg pard'n, sir, I suppose you're quite accustomed to 'osses, sir?"] * * * * * NOTES BY A COCKNEY NATURALIST There are various kinds of larks to be observed by Cockney naturalists, which are more or less, and rather less than more, indigenous to London. There is first of all the cage lark (_Alauda Miserrima_) which is chiefly found on grass-plats measuring about two inches square, and may be heard singing plaintively in many a back slum. Then there is the mud lark (_Alauda Greenwichiensis_), which is principally seen towards nightfall on the shores of the river, when the whitebait is in season. This little lark is a migratory bird, and flits from place to place in quest of anything worth picking up that may happen to be thrown to it. Finally, there is the street lark (_Alauda Nocturna_), which is known to most policemen in the neighbourhood of the Haymarket, and the like nocturnal haunts. As a gratifying proof of our progressing civilisation, there has been of recent years a very marked decrease in the number of white mice, and monkeys dressed as soldiers, exhibited by organ-grinders in the London streets. Trained dogs appear, however, decidedly more numerous, and performing canaries may be met with not infrequently in the squares of the West End. The naturalist should note, moreover, that the learned British pig (_Porcus Sapiens Britannicus_) which, within the memory of men who are still living, used commonly to infest the fairs near the metropolis, has recently well nigh completely disappeared and is believed by sundry naturalists to be utterly extinct. The rum shrub (_Shrubbus Curiosus_) which, although deserving of close investigation has somehow escaped mention in the pages of Linnaeus, is found in great profusion in the purlieus of Whitechapel, as well as other parts of London where dram-drinkers do congregate. It may be generally discovered in proximity to the Pot-tree (_Arbor Pewteriferens_), which may be readily recognised by its metallic fruit.