in society; it went out, or was withdrawn.
Then there is another omnibus reformer,
who claims to have effected still more in
our behoof. He states that his omnibus
has an interior space five inches higher
and four inches wider than that of ordinary
omnibuses; that there is a check-string
for each passenger; that there is an easy
mode of access to the outside for ladies as well as
gentlemen; that the seats within are
separated one from another, and are more roomy
than ordinary; that the heads of the outside
passengers are three feet lower than those of
the passengers who mount the formidable roofs
of our present omnibuses; that the driver,
without moving from his seat, can speedily
unroll an awning which will shelter the
outsiders in rainy weather; and that the vehicle
is neither more ponderous nor more expensive
than those of ordinary construction. The
truth, or otherwise, of these statements we
cannot determine; we only know that it is
highly desirable that it should be investigated.

The velocipedes, pedomotives, and manumotives,
have tried hard to roll themselves into
public favour; but they have not succeeded.
Once, now and then, we espy such a production,
the overtime work of some ingenious
mechanic, but we have hitherto observed his
work to be harder than walking.

The Tourists' Portable Life-boat is declared
by its inventor to be the lightest boat ever
made for crossing rivers and lakes, considering
its strength and buoyancy. It can, we
are told, be taken to pieces or put together in
a few minutes; and when folded up, it lies
snugly within a space of forty inches long,
twelve broad, and six deep. The account
which the inventor gives of his travels, and
of his search for eggs by the aid of this boat,
is quite graphic, and even magniloquent.
C. H. has had a man following him for thirty
miles a day, through rugged grounds, over
hill and heather, with this sort of boat carried
at his back, and used, when required, for
crossing the lakes and visiting the islands in
them, in search of ornithological specimens in
the West Highlands of Scotland and the
adjacent isles in the summer of eighteen
hundred and fifty. C. H. wishes to inform the
lovers of that enchanting study, ornithology,
that, by his long and indefatigable practice,
he has been enabled to observe the
attitudes and habits of British birds in general.
During the three summers of eighteen
hundred and forty-eight, forty-nine, and fifty,
he has travelled through Scotland and the
Western and Orkney Isles; in the course of
which time he has collected, with his own
hands, upwards of four thousand specimens
of birds and eggs! He has persevered so
much in the capture of some rare specimens,
that he has sometimes kept his clothes on for
fourteen days and nights in succession, and, at
times, has had very inclement weather to
contend with—running, walking, creeping,
and watching, without getting more sleep
than an occasional wink for a few minutes at
a time, when nature could stand it no longer,
and he really began to think his heavy
water-boots would grow to his legs. Now, if
practice, with much fatigue, is of any use in
teaching one the nature and habits of birds,
C. H. has no hesitation in stating that he
never met with any one who has gone
through so much labour in collecting and
preserving those highly-important and
beautiful objects of nature, whose solitudes,
haunts, and breeding-places, can only be
found and approached with great zeal. A
very Wilson or Audubon, truly! We would
respect the boat, for the sake of the man,
irrespective of its actual merits, whatever
they may be.

Portable boats have been an object of much
interest and solicitude to many ingenious
inventors. Every reader knows how the
Canadian voyageurs carry their boats over
the portages, in the prosecution of the
fur-trade; and most readers may know that
the desire of effecting this double result—the
man carrying the boat, and the boat carrying
the man—has led to many ingenious inventions.
A few years ago, when India-rubber
cloth was in the heyday of its novelty, men
were full of plans concerning portable boats.
There was built in France a sort of pontoon
about a hundred feet long, consisting of a
skeleton-frame which was easily detached
and folded into one-sixth of the space which
it occupied as a boat; it folded together like
a portfolio, the frame being hinged to the
keel. It was covered with India-rubber
cloth, and was provided with partitioned
air-cells in various parts. In such a boat it is
asserted that more than a hundred tons
of wood and wine were safely navigated
down the Yonne and Seine from Auxerre to
Paris. The boat was then taken to pieces in three
or four minutes, and conveyed back on two
small carts. Wnen we want portable boats,
inventors are at hand, it is plain.

He who would duly study the project for
balloon-steering, must rise betimes, and spend
a long day upon it. What of the self-propelling
rotary balloon? All fair and above-board,
of course. The balloon, being made to
rotate by a hand passed over it, is expected
—if it behave as a reasonable balloon should—
to progress through the air; and as it is in
itself a sort of buoyant screw, it will progress
at each rotation through a distance equal to
one thread of the screw; an engine in the
car is to be worked by steam-power, generated
by hydrogen or coal-gas; and while the
balloon is its own propeller, the car is its own
rudder, for the course of the balloon is to be
guided by shifting the points of suspension
of the car. Then, the Charvolant, or carriage
drawn by kites—what a pity if such a brave
locomotive should be humbled! How that
there is a double-bodied phaeton; that there
are two kites to furnish the propelling- power;
that the driver in the phaeton can vary the