Town, said to be a retired gentleman: Mr.
Samuel Flick, a man of great influence in the
tooth-brush trade: the Rev. Joshua Jerry, a
clergyman with enlarged views and contracted
means: and two or three more equally eligible
members of the leisure classes. It was
decided that the promoters ought to bear all
the preliminary expenses; so that when the
Board passed a very liberal resolution to
advertise largely, I, Rigging, and the inventor
had to take counsel of one another. I need not
reveal the cost at which we scraped money
together to pay for long advertisements in the
morning papers.

These were inserted day after day.
Applications for shares came in, in prodigious
quantities. Mr. Troubadub of Pentonville
wanted five hundred shares; Mr. Barleymus
of Bermondsey would be glad to pay on seven
hundred and fifty; Mr. Tumbledon of the Old
Kent Road would feel obliged by an allotment
of six hundred. Hundreds of other gentlemen
were equally obliging. Sixty-two thousand
three hundred and twenty-seven shares
were applied for by the day the books were
announced as being about to close: twenty-
five thousand were judiciously allotted.

That is some time ago: calls upon only
three hundred and one have as yet been paid.
Our expenses have now amounted to seven
hundred pounds; and at this moment the
Honourable Chester Titbury has got his
jewelled fingers in the little bowl of sovereigns
on the Board table. When the proportion of
capital prescribed by the Act of Parliament
has been paid up, we hope to be completely
registered. It is not, however, our intention
to bring out the Patent Corkscrew until
the invention is fully protected by law.

QUAILS.

FEW events occur to disturb the quiet
of the picturesque little island of Capri.
There is a mild act of revolution now and
then; and sometimes his Excellency the
Syndico announces the receipt of a
fulminante decreto from head-quarters; but, with
the exception of such occasional alarms, the
contadino pursues the even tenor of his
way, unconscious almost of the existence of
any world beyond the boundaries of his
Commune. He digs, and sows, and drinks
his carafe of wine, and eats his slice of
onion, is bled once a month, has a tocco, dies,
is cast into the pit, and so finishes his
uneventful life of threescore years and ten.

The arrival of the Quails, however, produces
periodical interruptions to this state
of somniferous equanimity, causing as great
a disturbance as the Carnival does in that
of the Roman. What a bustling, merry season
it is! Everybody dreams and thinks
and speaks of nothing but quails. Ask a good
man what he has had for dinner? "Quails!
Quails!" is his answer. Whatever corner
you turn, ten to one but you come against
some rough sportsman, half-fisherman, half-labourer.
What game is he after? "Quails."
If you would take a quiet walk in the country,
you stumble on men carrying in their
extended arms immense nets. What are they
going to catch in them? "Quails." In short,
every question you ask, is answered by the
word "Quails."

The first indication of the approach of this
season is the erection of lofty poles, some
forty feet high, on what are known to be the
most favourable spots close to the sea, or
else on the summits of lofty rocks, at the
opening of a deep gully or narrow valley
through which the storm sweeps in the
timid travellers, or where, in the quiet of a
spring or autumn night, they love to nestle
and repose. Often you will see the figure of
a Madonna bound round the pole, or a sprig
of blessed olive attached to the top of it; for
quail-netting is something more than a sport:
it is a serious speculation to the poor
countryman, who eagerly looks out for a Providenza
to pay a portion of his rental. In this
way the whole island is circled round by a
net-work, so that the expected visitors have
small chance of escape: netter and gunner,
man, woman, and child are impatiently waiting
and hoping for the arrival. At last it is
announced in the Piazza, that D. Pasquale
or D. Giuseppe has shot a quail—the very
first. The place, the time, the number of
shots, and the way of the wind are all
inquired into; and speculation is rife as to the
prospects of the morrow. The old
campaigner casts a knowing glance at the
heavens and damps their hopes it is a west
wind, or the quail was no quail at all it was
a baffonia (Favouius). At length down dips
the sun into the sea, so clear and sharp;
and the maestrale blows fresh, making hope
certainty. Active preparations are set on.
foot; guns are cleaned, shot-bags and powder-flasks
are filled; and by one hour of
night the whole population is sunk in sound,
sound sleep. So absorbing indeed has been
the one last thought, that a watcher might
expect to see the heavy sleeper twitch like
a spaniel, and give a short sharp bark; if
he does dream, his dream will be of quails.

At three o'clock in the morning all are on
the alert, for your quail rises early, and the
nets are drawn up by pulleys to the very
tops of the poles. Men take their stations on
the highest points to give notice of the approach
of the birds, or to mark the spots
where those alight who may have escaped.
At length the looker-out utters a loud shriek
at the very top of his voice, which is taken up
by those who stand about the nets, and then
again by the rocks; so that the novice might
fancy himself in a Pandemonium. The quails
are coming, and yet your unpractised eye
looking seaward will not be able to discover
a speck. But sure enough in they come—
two, three, four at a time—sometimes more.
Tired with their long spring flight,—for then