A good many years ago, a man named Alexander Wilson, a Scotchman by birth, wrote a large book, called “American Ornithology,” in which he described almost all the birds belonging to this country, and gave an account of their nests and eggs, their food and habits, and migrations, or removing from one part of the country to another, &c. He also made pictures of all the birds described in his book, which were beautifully colored with the natural colors of the birds themselves. Since then, another celebrated naturalist, (as those men are called, who study the works of nature,) Mr. John J. Audubon, has made a still larger book, with pictures, of the size of life, of all the birds described by Mr. Wilson and many others, and colored also in the same beautiful manner, and sometimes having several pictures of the same bird, in different attitudes, and showing its different habits, such as procuring its food, building or sitting on its nest, defending its young, &c. One copy of these books, (which consists of five very large volumes, as large as a small table, besides the volumes which contain the descriptions and accounts of the habits or biography of the birds,) costs the very great sum of one thousand dollars. It is very beautiful indeed, and I hope all Robert Merry’s black and blue-eyed friends will one day have an opportunity to look at either this or Mr. Wilson’s book, and see such beautiful pictures as they contain. As almost all good boys and girls are fond of seeing birds, and hearing about them, I think they will like to read something more about them in Merry’s Museum; and this is the reason why I propose to write about some of them. I hope, too, that none of those children who read the Museum, will be guilty of wantonly killing the little birds, or robbing their nests of the eggs and young, as some cruel boys do, but will learn to love them and treat them kindly. I will here copy a short story from Mr. Audubon’s book, that I have been telling about. “On the 4th of January, we stopped at Bonnet Carré, where I entered a house to ask some questions about birds. I was received by a venerable French gentleman, whom I found in charge of about a dozen children of both sexes, and who was delighted to hear that I was a student of nature. He was well acquainted with my old friend Charles Carré, and must, I thought, be a good man, for he said he never suffered any of his pupils to rob a bird of her eggs or young, although, said he with a smile, ‘they are welcome to peep at them and love them.’ The boys at once surrounded me, and from them I received satisfactory answers to most of my inquiries respecting birds.” This shows what feelings good children should have towards birds.