Demmin, from whose work these figures are taken, mentions that at the siege of Mons, in 1691, the grenadiers of the elder Dauphin’s regiment stormed the walls under the command of Vauban, and, by means of the Scaling-fork, carried the breastwork, which they assaulted. As a mark of honour to these gallant men, Louis XIV. ordered that the sergeants of the regiment should carry scaling-forks instead of halberds, which had been the peculiar weapon of the sergeant until comparatively late days, just as the spontoon, or half-pike, was the weapon of the infantry officer from A.D. 1700 to A.D. 1800, or thereabouts. The English student will remember that in the writings of Sterne, Fielding, and Smollett the half-pike is frequently mentioned as the weapon of a subaltern officer. Demmin states that the last spontoons used in France were carried by the French Guards in 1789. * * * * * PERHAPS the Climbing-spur may be familiar to some of my readers, and bring back a reminiscence of boyhood. There is nothing more tantalising to a boy than to see a hawk, or magpie nest at the top of a tree which is too large to be climbed in the ordinary way, and which has no branches within many feet of the ground. However, boyish ingenuity has brought almost any tree within the power of a bird’s-nester by the invention of the Climbing-irons. These are made so as to pass under the foot like a stirrup, and can be secured to the leg by leathern straps, the hooks being, of course, on the inside of the leg. The cut represents the Climbing-iron of the right leg. By means of these instruments, a very large tree can be mounted, the irons being struck firmly into the bark, and the legs moved alternately, and not in the usual manner of climbing. Sometimes the hook of the Climbing-iron is terminated by a single instead of a double point, but the principle is the same in all. * * * * * WE will now look for similar examples in Nature. On the right of the left-hand group is shown the larva or grub of the common Tiger-beetle, which is itself a curious creature. It lives in perpendicular burrows, feeding upon those insects which come within its reach. Its usual position is at the upper part of the burrow, with its jaws widely extended, so as to snap up any insect that may venture too near.