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* THE GREAT AMERICAN BITTERN. A most interesting and remarkable circumstance we learn from the _Magazine of Natural History_, attends the great American Bittern; it is that it has the power of emitting a light from its breast equal to the light of a common torch, which illuminates the water so as to enable it to discover its prey. As this circumstance is not mentioned by any naturalist, the correspondent of the journal in question, took every precaution to determine, as he has done, the truth of it. * * * * * Notes of a Reader. * * * * * BRITISH SEA SONGS. One of our earliest naval ballads is derived from the Pepys Collection, and is supposed to have been written in the reign of Queen Elizabeth. It records the events of a sea-fight in the reign of Henry the Eighth, between Lord Howard and Sir Andrew Barton, a Scotch pirate; and it is rendered curious by the picture it presents of naval engagements in those days, and by a singular fact which transpires in the course of the details; namely, that the then maritime force of England consisted of only _two ships of war_. In Percy's "Reliques of Ancient Poetry," there is another old marine ballad, called the "Winning of _Cales_," a name which our sailors had given to Cadiz. This affair took place in June, 1596; but the description of it in the old song presents nothing peculiar, or worthy of attention as regards naval manners. From this period, I cannot at present call to mind any sea song of importance till Gay's "Black-eyed Susan," which, you know, has maintained its popularity to the present hour, and which deserves to have done so, no less on account of the beauty of the verses, than of the pathetic air in the minor to which they are set. This was, at no great length of time, succeeded by Stevens's "Storm," a song which, I believe you will all allow, stands deservedly at the head of the lyrics of the deep. The words are nautically correct, the music is of a manly and original character, and the subject-matter is one of the most interesting of the many striking incidents common to sea-life. These fine ballads, if I mistake not, were succeeded by one or two popular songs, with music by Dr. Arne; then came those of Dibdin, which were in their turn followed by a host of compositions, distinguished more by the strenuous, robust character of the music, than by poetical excellence, or
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