SOME

THE HONEY-BUZZARD.

OME words that are a good deal like each other mean very different things. For instance, timbrel and tumbril. A timbrel is a musical instrument, though there is not much music in it; a tumbril is a cart. Again, take curlew and curfew. A curlew is a bird; the curfew was the name of the evening bell, or of what the evening bell meant, namely that you were to put out your fires. Now, the word bustard is not unlike the word buzzard, but a bustard is one sort of bird, and a buzzard is another sort of bird.

The bustard is a great creature, sometimes weighing as much as 30 pounds. It is one of the birds called Waders. It does not make much use of its wings, though it can fly. It lives mostly on great plains, and runs when hunted. It has been caught by hounds; and there is a good deal of the ostrich about the creature. The Great Bustard was once pretty common in this country, but where you would find one now is more than I can tell you.

But why are we talking about bustards? The birds in the picture are honey-buzzards, and they belong not to the family of Waders, but to the family of Falcons. How well the falcon tribe of birds fly I need not tell you,_or what lively, handsome birds they are. their flat heads, keen eyes, and sharp-curved beaks make them look very cruel.

But

The honey-buzzard is not a common bird in England. In spite of its name, it does not feed on honey; but on bees, wasps, and other insects. It digs up the ground to get at the insect's nest. Besides this sort of food, the honey-buzzard will eat lizards, and such small birds as it can catch, but it would rather have insects to eat.

The honey-buzzard, or Pern-which is another name for the same creature-differs from the common buzzard in the feathers just above the beak and under the eyes, and it is rather a larger bird.

SUGARPLUM LAND.

CHAPTER II.

THE HERE is some more to say about the Face of the Country. It is found that treacle, raspberry-cream, ginger-beer, and lemonade for the most part form the rivers and lakes; while the fields are chiefly almond paste and iced sugar, green sugarplums being dangerous. There are, however, a few greengage meadows, shaded here and there by almond trees (the fruit is of course all bleached) lying below the high sugarloaf mountains. Christmas-trees, as I need hardly say, blossom all the year round; and no hen is allowed to lay any but Easter eggs.

A light shower of raspberry vinegar falls occasionally, and now and then there is a storm of hundreds and thousands. The king and queen hold their court on a large twelfth cake. There are a few foreigners who attend— French plums and German toys.

As the barberry and acid drops rolled into the country, they saw many pleasant and surprising sights. Numbers of dolls of all sorts and sizes were walking about, or driving in clockwork carriages. In the dolls' houses some inmates (principally china) were in baths rubbing themselves clean with sponge cake. Others, dressed as servants, were pumping up water from toy pumps, or cooking serviceable wooden joints of meat at large burnt-almond fires. Grooms in toy stables were busy harnessing horses. Butchers, grocers, and basketmakers' shops did a busy trade. Dairy-maids in Swiss villages milked cows. Bathing machines were filled with gaily chattering dolls going to bathe in the large raspberrycream lake, while others tried to catch the magnet fish in Treacle River (the places dangerous from brimstone being marked), or fed the swans and geese with gingerbread. Tin soldiers were drilling on a spacious greengage plain. Tops and balls bounded about in rather an aimless manner; while the bagatelle and croquet balls, who played rather more according to rule, laughed at their funny antics. Fireworks kept going off as hard as they could, startling the rocking-horses till they galloped wildly about. Clockwork animals ran up and down the roads. Indeed, it was dreadful to see the number of wild beasts. However, as they only went round and round, or in one straight line, it was comparatively easy to avoid them.

Presently the Noah's ark creatures came out, in a nice orderly manner, two and two, elephants first, closely followed by beetles nearly as large.

Next came the parlour games, a very genteel but rather stupid family.

Punch and Judy strolled along, not arm-inarm, because Judy had the baby to carry. They were attended, of course, by Toby, in a neat starched frill. Punch was made rather cross by some dancing Marionnettes who tried to imitate him, but had no conversational powers. Next came a large party of fairy-tale heroes and heroines. Puss-in

Hubbard's dog, and Mother Hubbard herself was driving with Cinderella in a pumpkin carriage.

Humpty-Dumpty sat on a wall making faces at the passers by, and occasionally pretending to fall. The king's horses and men stood near in order to render him any help they could in case of accident. Neither of them could help little Bo-peep, or take pussy out of the well, however. There are many things which the king's horses and men cannot do.

Soon, sounds of music enlivened the scene. All the toy creatures made squeaking noises, accompanied by fiddles, penny whistles, trumpets, drums, and other musical instruments. Singing-birds, whose heads came off and on, and who were stuffed with sugarplums, sang gaily, and above all could be heard the odd voices of talking-dolls.

But the best fun was among the conjuring tricks, who were spending the time in all sorts of practical jokes, while gutta-percha faces and grinning masks laughed at them. There were a few comic magic-lanterns and picturebooks. But the king was rather suspicious of the latter, for three or four who had sneaked in had been thought to bring alphabets or other information with them, and no sense of any kind was admitted.

It is very sad to have to relate that some quarrelling took place among the peppermint and ginger lozenges, who were all hot-tempered.

"It's always the way," said the king, when he heard of it; "there is always some trouble with people who have ever been in a doctor's shop.'

However, they laid all the blame on some rude brandy-balls, who were rolled out of the country.

I need hardly add that the liquorice-stick and the barberry and acidulated drops made

about a book called the ILIAD, written

in Greek by a blind old man named HOMER? Almost everybody has heard or read at least a little about it, and we must say something of it among the Books of All Ages. Who

was HOMER? That is what learned men do not agree about. Did he write all the Iliad? That also is a matter that learned men have not settled. The long poem called the "Iliad" is about the siege of a city called Troy. Where was Troy? Learned men HOMER, in the "Iliad," says

are not sure.

it was at the foot of Mount Ida, and that its walls were built by the God of the Sea, and by the God of the Sun, Apollo.

The story of the Trojan Horse is not so well known as Jack the Giant Killer, but still it is very well known indeed. That was an artful idea. The Greeks had been for ten years trying to get inside Troy, and make themselves masters of it; but they could not. At last they built a very, very high horse of pine wood and other things, and filled it with armed soldiers. This horse they sent into the city of Troy as a religious present, and so the Trojans let it be wheeled in, though a few of them were afraid of some trick. At dead of night the soldiers inside the horse undid the secret doors and stepped out, and undid the gates of the city and let their friends, the Greeks outside, into the city.

The "Iliad" of Homer is all about fight