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2. Song-thrush,
Turdus simpliciter dictus:
In February and on to August, reassume their song in autumn.

3. Wren,
Passer troglodytes:
All the year, hard frost excepted.

4. Red-breast,
Rubecula:
Ditto.

5. Hedge-sparrow,
Curruca:
Early in February to July the 10th.

6. Yellow-hammer,
Emberiza flava:
Early in February, and on through July to August the 21st.

7. Skylark,
Alauda vulgaris:
In February, and on to October.

8. Swallow,
Hirundo domestica:
From April to September.

9. Black-cap,
Atricapilla:
Beginning of April to July 13.

10. Titlark,
Alauda pratorum:
From middle of April to July the 16th.

11. Blackbird,
Merula vulgaris:
Sometimes in February and March, and so on to July the twenty
third; reassumes in autumn.

12. White-throat,
Ficedulcae affinis:
In April and on to July 23.

13. Goldfinch,
Carduelis:
April and through to September 16.

14. Greenfinch,
Chloris:
On to July and August 2.

15. Less reed-sparrow,
Passer arundinaceus minor:
May, on to beginning of July.

16. Common linnet,
Linaria vulgaris:
Breeds and whistles on till August; reassumes its note when they
begin to congregate in October, and again early before the flock
separate.

Birds that cease to be in full song, and are usually silent at or
before Midsurnmer:

17. Middle willow-wren,
Regulus non cristatus:
Middle of June: begins in April.

18. Red-start,
Ruticilla:
Middle of June: begins in May.

19. Chaffinch,
Fringilla:
Beginning of June: sings first in February.

20. Nightingale,
Luscinia:
Middle of June: sings first in April.

Birds that sing for a short tune, and very early in the spring:

21. Missel-bird,
Turdus viscivorus:
January the 2nd, 1770, in February. Is called in Hampshire and
Sussex the storm -cock, because its song is supposed to forebode
windy wet weather: is the largest singing bird we have.

22. Great tit-mouse, or ox-eye,
Fringillago:
In February, March, April: reassumes for a short time in
September.

Birds that have somewhat of a note or song, and yet are hardly to
be called singing birds:

23. Golden-crowned wren,
Regulus cristatus:
Its note as minute as its person; frequents the tops of high oaks and
firs; the smallest British bird.

24. Marsh titmouse,
Parus palustris:
Haunts great woods; two harsh sharp notes.

25. Small willow-wren,
Regulus non cristatus:
Sings in March and on to September.

26. Largest ditto,
Ditto:
Cantat voce stridula locustae: from end of April to August.

27. Grasshopper-lark,
Alauda minima voce locustae:
Chirps all night, from the middle of April to the end of July

28. Martin,
Hirundo agrestis:
All the breeding time; from May to September.

29. Bullfinch,
Pyrrhula:

30. Bunting,
Emberiza alba:
From the end of January to July.

All singing birds, and those that have any pretensions to song, not
only in Britain, but perhaps the world through, come under the
Linnaean ordo of passeres.

The above-mentioned birds, as they stand numerically, belong to
the following Linnaean genera.

1, 7, 10, 27.
Alauda.

2, 11, 21.
Turdus.

3, 4, 5, 9, 12, 15, 17, 18, 20, 23, 25, 26.
Motacilla.

6, 30.
Emberiza.

8, 28.
Hirundo.

13, 16, 19.
Pringilla.

22, 24.
Parus.

14, 29.
Loxia.

Birds that sing as they fly are but few:

Skylark,
Raii nomina.
Alauda vulgaris:
Rising, suspended, and falling.

Titlark,
Alauda pratorum:
In its descent; also sitting on trees, and walking on the ground.

Woodlark,
Alauda arborea:
Suspended; in hot summer nights all night long.

Blackbird,
Merula:
Sometimes from bush to bush.

White-throat,
Ficedulae affinis:
Uses when singing on the wing odd jerks and gesticulations.

Swallow,
Hirundo domestica:
In soft sunny weather.

Wren,
Passer troglodytes:
Sometimes from bush to bush.

Birds that breed most early in these parts:

Raven,
Corvus:
Hatches in February and March.

Song-thrush,
Turdus:
In March.

Blackbird,
Merula:
In March.

Rook,
Cornix frugilega:
Builds the beginning of March.

Woodlark,
Alauda arborea:
Hatches in April.

Ring-dove,
Palurnbus torquatus:
Lays the beginning of April.

All birds that continue in full song till after Midsummer appear to
me to breed more than once.

Most kinds of birds seem to me to be wild and shy somewhat in
proportion to their bulk; I mean in this island, where they are much
pursued and annoyed: but in Ascension-island, and many other
desolate places, mariners have found fowls so unacquainted with
an human figure, that they would stand still to be taken; as is the
case with boobies, etc. As an example of what is advanced, I
remark that the golden-crested wren (the smallest British bird) will
stand unconcerned till you come within three or four yards of it,
while the bustard (otis), the largest British land fowl, does not care
to admit a person within so many furlongs.

I am, etc.

Letter III
To The Honourable Daines Barrington

Selborne, Jan. 15, 1770.

Dear Sir,

It was no small matter of satisfaction to me to find that you were
not displeased with my little methodus of birds. If there was any
merit in the sketch, it must be owing to its punctually. For many
months I carried a list in my pocket of the birds that were to be
remarked, and, as I rode or walked about my business, I noted each
day the continuance or omission of each bird's song; so that I am as
sure of the certainty of my facts as a man can be of any transaction
whatsoever.

I shall now proceed to answer the several queries which you put in
your two obliging letters, in the best manner that I am able.
Perhaps Eastwick, and its environs, where you heard so very few
birds, is not a woodland country, and therefore not stocked with
such songsters. If you will cast your eye on my last letter, you will
find that many species continued to warble after the beginning of
July.

The titlark and yellowhammer breed late, the latter very late; and
therefore it is no wonder that they protract their song; for I lay it
down as a maxim in ornithology, that as long as there is any
incubation going on there is music. As to the red-breast and wren,
it is well known to the most incurious observer that they whistle
the year round, hard frost excepted; especially the latter.

It was not in my power to procure you a black-cap, or a less reed-
sparrow, or sedge-bird, alive. As the first is undoubtedly, and the
last, as far as I can yet see, a summer bird of passage, they would
require more nice and curious management in a cage than I should
be able to give them; they are both distinguished songsters. The
note of the former has such a wild sweetness that it always brings
to my mind those lines in a song in As You Like It,

And tune his merry note
Unto the wild bird's throat.-Shakespeare.

The latter has a surprising variety of notes resembling the song of
several other birds; but then it also has an hurrying mariner, not at
all to its advantage; it is notwithstanding a delicate polyglot.

It is new to me that titlarks in cages sing in the night; perhaps only
caged birds do so. I once knew a tame red-breast in a cage that
always sang as long as candles were in the room; but in their wild
state no one supposes they sing in the night.

I should be almost ready to doubt the fact, that there are to be seen
much fewer birds in July than in any former month,
notwithstanding so many young are hatched daily. Sure I am that it
is far otherwise with respect to the swallow tribe, which increases
prodigiously as the summer advances: and I saw, at the time
mentioned, many hundreds of young wagtails on the banks of the
Cherwell, which almost covered the meadows. If the matter
appears as you say in the other species, may it not be owing to the
dams being engaged in incubation, while the young are concealed
by the leaves ?

Many times have I had the curiosity to open the stomachs of
woodcocks and snipes; but nothing ever occurred that helped to
explain to me what their subsistence might be: all that I could ever
find was a soft mucus, among which lay many pellucid small
gravels.

I am, etc.

Letter IV
To The Honourable Daines Barrington

Selborne, Feb. 19, 1770.

Dear Sir,

Your observation that 'the cuckoo does not deposit its egg
indiscriminately in the nest of the first bird that comes in its way,
but probably looks out a nurse in some degree congenerous, with
whom to intrust its young,' is perfectly new to me; and struck me so
forcibly, that I naturally fell into a train of thought that led me to
consider whether the fact was so, and what reason there was for it.
When I came to recollect and inquire, I could not find that any
cuckoo had ever been seen in these parts, except in the nest of the
wagtail, the hedge-sparrow, the titlark, the white-throat, and the
red-breast, all soft-billed insectivorous birds. The excellent Mr.
Willughby mentions the nest of the palumbus (ring-dove), and of
the fringilla (chaffinch), birds that subsist on acorns and grains, and
such hard food: but then he does not mention them as of his own
knowledge; but says afterwards that he saw himself a wagtail
feeding a cuckoo. It appears hardly possible that a soft-billed bird
should subsist on the same food with the hard-billed: for the former
have thin membranaceous stomachs suited to their soft food; while
the latter, the granivorous tribe, have strong muscular gizzards,
which, like mills, grind, by the help of small gravels and pebbles,
what is swallowed. This proceeding of the cuckoo, of dropping its
eggs as it were by chance, is such a monstrous outrage on maternal
affection, one of the first great dictates of nature, and such a
violence on instinct, that, had it only been related of a bird in the
Brazils, or Peru, it would never have merited our belief. But yet,
should it farther appear that this simple bird, when divested of the
natural storge(in Greek) that seems to raise the kind in general
above themselves, and inspire them with extraordinary degrees of
cunning and address, may be still endued with a more enlarged
faculty of discerning what species are suitable and congenerous
nursing-mothers for its disregarded eggs and young, and may
deposit them only under their care, this would be adding wonder to
wonder, and instancing in a fresh manner that the methods of
Providence are not subjected to any mode or rule, but astonish us
in new lights, and in various and changeable appearances.

What was said by a very ancient and sublime writer concerning the
defect of natural affection in the ostrich, may be well applied to the
bird we are talking of:

'She is hardened against her young ones, as though they were not
hers:

Because God hath deprived her of wisdom, neither hath he
imparted to her understanding.' *
(* Job xxxix. 16, 17.)

Query.--Does each female cuckoo lay but one egg in a season, or
does she drop several in different nests according as opportunity
offers?

I am, etc.

Letter V
To The Honourable Daines Barrington

Selborne, April 12, 1770.

Dear Sir,

I heard many birds of several species sing last year after
Midsummer; enough to prove that the summer solstice is not the
period that puts a stop to the music of the woods. The
yellowhammer no doubt persists with more steadiness than any
other; but the woodlark, the wren, the red-breast, the swallow, the
white-throat, the goldfinch, the common linnet, are all undoubted
instances of the truth of what I advance.

If this severe season does not interrupt the regularity of the summer
migrations, the black-cap will be here in two or three days. I wish it
was in my power to procure you one of those songsters; but I am no
birdcatcher; and so little used to birds in a cage, that I fear if I had
one it would soon die for want of skill in feeding.

Was your reed-sparrow, which you kept in a cage, the thick-billed
reed-sparrow of the Zoology, p. 320; or was it the less reed-
sparrow of Ray, the sedge-bird of Mr. Pennant's last publication, p.
16?

As to the matter of long-billed birds growing fatter in moderate
frosts, I have no doubt within myself what should be the reason.
The thriving at those times appears to me to arise altogether from
the gentle check which the cold throws upon insensible
perspiration. The case is just the same with blackbirds, etc.; and
farmers and warreners observe, the first, that their hogs fat more
kindly at such times, and the latter that the rabbits are never in such
good case as in a gentle frost. But when frosts are severe, and of
long continuance, the case is soon altered; for then a want of food
soon overbalances the repletion occasioned by a checked
perspiration. I have observed, moreover, that some human
constitutions are more inclined to plumpness in winter than in
summer.

When birds come to suffer by severe frost, I find that the first that
fail and die are the redwing-fieldfares, and then the song-thrushes.

You wonder, with good reason, that the hedge-sparrows, etc., can
be induced to sit at all on the egg of the cuckoo without being
scandalized at the vast disproportioned size of the supposititious
egg; but the brute creation, I suppose, have very little idea of size,
colour, or number. For the common hen, I know, when the fury of
incubation is on her, will sit on a single shapeless stone instead of a
nest full of eggs that have been withdrawn: and, moreover, a hen-
turkey, in the same circumstances, would sit on in the empty nest
till she perished with hunger.

I think the matter might easily be determined whether a cuckoo
lays one or two eggs, or more, in a season, by opening a female
during the laying-time. If more than one was come down out of the
ovary, and advanced to a good size, doubtless then she would that
spring lay more than one.

I will endeavour to get a hen, and to examine.

Your supposition that there may be some natural obstruction in
singing birds while they are mute, and that when this is removed
the song recommences is new and bold; I wish you could discover
some good grounds for this suspicion.

I was glad you were pleased with my specimen of the caprimulgus,
or fern-owl; you were, I find, acquainted with the bird before.

When we meet, I shall be glad to have some conversation with you
concerning the proposal you make of my drawing up an account of
the animals in this neighbourhood. Your partiality towards my
small abilities persuades you, I fear, that I am able to do more than
is in my power: for it is no small undertaking for a man
unsupported and alone to begin a natural history from his own
autopsia! Though there is endless room for observation in the field
of nature, which is boundless, yet investigation (where a man
endeavours to be sure of his facts) can make but slow progress; and
all that one could collect in many years would go into a very
narrow compass.

Some extracts from your ingenious 'Investigations of the difference
between the present temperature of the air in Italy,' etc., have fallen
in my way, and gave me great satisfaction: they have removed the
objections that always rose in my mind whenever I came to the
passages which you quote. Surely the judicious Virgil, when
writing a didactic poem for the region of Italy, could never think of
describing freezing rivers, unless such severity of weather pretty
frequently occurred!

P.S. Swallows appear amidst snows and frost.

Letter VI
To The Honourable Daines Barrington

Selborne, May 21, 1770.

Dear Sir,

The severity and turbulence of last month so interrupted the regular
progress of summer migration, that some of the birds do but just
begin to show themselves, and others are apparently thinner than
usual; as the white-throat, the black-cap, the red-start, the fly-
catcher. I well remember that after the very severe spring in the
year 1739-40 summer birds of passage were very scarce. They
come probably hither with a south-east wind, or when it blows
between those points; but in that unfavourable year the winds
blowed the whole spring and summer through from the opposite
quarters. And yet amidst all these disadvantages two swallows, as I
mentioned in my last, appeared this year as early as the eleventh of
April amidst frost and snow; but they withdrew again for a time.

I am not pleased to find that some people seem so little satisfied
with Scopoli's new publication; * there is room to expect great
things from the hands of that man, who is a good naturalist: and
one would think that an history of the birds of so distant and
southern a region as Carniola would be new and interesting. I could
wish to see that work, and hope to get it sent down. Dr. Scopoli is
physician to the wretches that work in the quicksilver mines of that
district.
(* This work he calls his Annus Primus Historico-Naturalis.)

When you talked of keeping a reed-sparrow, and giving it seeds, I
could not help wondering; because the reed-sparrow which I
mentioned to you (passer arundinaceus minor Raii) is a soft-billed
bird; and most probably migrates hence before winter; whereas the
bird you kept (passer torquatus Raii) abides all the year, and is a
thick-billed bird. I question whether the latter be much of a
songster; but in this matter I want to be better informed. The
former has a variety of hurrying notes, and sings all night. Some
part of the song of the former, I suspect, is attributed to the latter.
We have plenty of the soft-billed sort; which Mr. Pennant had
entirely left out of his British Zoology, till I reminded him of his
omission. See British Zoology last published, p. 16.**
(** See Letter XXV to Mr. Pennant.)

I have somewhat to advance on the different manners in which
different birds fly and walk; but as this is a subject that I have not
enough considered, and is of such a nature as not to be contained in
a small space, I shall say nothing farther about it at present.*
(* See Letter XLIII to Mr. Barrington.)

No doubt the reason why the sex of birds in their first plumage is
so difficult to be distinguished is, as you say, 'because they are not
to pair and discharge their parental functions till the ensuing
spring.' As colours seem to be the chief external sexual distinction
in many birds, these colours do not take place till sexual
attachments begin to obtain. And the case is the same in
quadrupeds; among whom, in their younger days, the sexes differ
but little: but, as they advance to maturity, horns and shaggy
manes, beards and brawny necks, etc., etc., strongly discriminate
the male from the female. We may instance still farther in our own
species, where a beard and stronger features are usually
characteristic of the male sex: but this sexual diversity does not
take place in earlier life; for a beautiful youth shall be so like a
beautiful girl that the difference shall not be discernible:

Quem si puellarum insereres choro,
Mire sagaces falleret hospites
Discrimen obscurum, solutis
Crinibus, ambiguoque vultu.--HOR.

Letter VII
To The Honourable Daines Barrington

Ringmer, near Lewes, Oct. 8, 1770.

Dear Sir,

I am glad to hear that Kuckalm is to furnish you with the birds of
Jamaica; a sight of the hirundines of that hot and distant island
would be great entertainment to me.

The Anni of Scopoli are now in my possession; and I have read the
Annus Primus with satisfaction: for though some parts of this work
are exceptionable, and he may advance some mistaken
observations; yet the ornithology of so distant a country as Carniola
is very curious. Men that undertake only one district are much
more likely to advance natural knowledge than those that grasp at
more than they can possibly be acquainted with: every kingdom,
every province, should have its own monographer.

The reason perhaps why he mentions nothing of Ray's Ornithology
may be the extreme poverty and distance of his country, into which
the works of our great naturalist may have never yet found their
way. You have doubts, I know, whether this Ornithology is
genuine, and really the work of Scopoli: as to myself, I think I
discover strong tokens of authenticity; the style corresponds with
that of his Entomology: and his characters of his Ordines and
Genera are many of them new, expressive, and masterly. He has
ventured to alter some of the Linnaean genera with sufficient show
of reason.

It might perhaps be mere accident that you saw so many swifts and
no swallows at Staines; because, in my long observations of those
birds, I never could discover the least degree of rivalry or hostility
between the species.

Ray remarks that birds of the gallinae order, as cocks and hens,
partridges, and pheasants, etc., are pulveratrices, such as dust
themselves, using that method of cleansing their feathers, and
ridding themselves of their vermin. As far as I can observe, many
birds that dust themselves never wash: and I once thought that
those birds that wash themselves would never dust; but here I find
myself mistaken; for common house-sparrows are great
pulveratrices, being frequency seen grovelling and wallowing in
dusty roads; and yet they are great washers. Does not the skylark
dust?

Query.--Might not Mahomet and his followers take one method of
purification from these pulveratrices? because I find from
travellers of credit, that if a strict Mussulman is journeying in a
sandy desert where no water is to be found, at stated hours he strips
off his clothes, and most scrupulously rubs his body over with sand
or dust.

A countryman told me he had found a young fern-owl in the nest of
a small bird on the ground; and that it was fed by the little bird. I
went to see this extraordinary phenomenon, and found that it was a
young cuckoo hatched in the nest of a titlark; it was become vastly
too big for its nest, appearing

... in tenui re
Majores pennas nido extendisse ...

and was very fierce and pugnacious, pursuing my finger, as I teased
it, for many feet from the nest, and sparring and buffeting with its
wings like a game-cock. The dupe of a dam appeared at a distance,
hovering about with meat in its mouth, and expressing the greatest
solicitude.

In July I saw several cuckoos skimming over a large pond; and
found, after some observation, that they were feeding on the
libellulae, or dragon-flies; some of which they caught as they
settled on the weeds, and some as they were on the wing.
Notwithstanding what Linnaeus says, I cannot be induced to
believe that they are birds of prey.

This district affords some birds that are hardly ever heard of at
Selborne. In the first place considerable flocks of cross-beaks
(loxiae curvirostrae) have appeared this summer in the pine-groves
belonging to this house; the water-ousel is said to haunt the mouth
of the Lewes river, near Newhaven; and the Cornish chough builds,
I know, all along the chalky cliffs of the Sussex shore.

I was greatly pleased to see little parties of ring-ousels (my newly-
discovered migrators) scattered, at intervals, all along the Sussex-
downs from Chichester to Lewes. Let them come from whence
they will, it looks very auspicious that they are cantoned along the
coast in order to pass the channel when severe weather advances.
They visit us again in April, as it should seem, in their return; and
are not to be found in the dead of winter. It is remarkable that they
are very tame, and seem to have no manner of apprehensions of
danger from a person with a gun. There are bustards on the wide
downs near Brighthelmstone. No doubt you are acquainted with the
Sussex-downs: the prospects and rides round Lewes are most
lovely!

As I rode along near the coast I kept a very sharp lookout in the
lanes and woods, hoping I might, at this time of the year, have
discovered some of the summer short-winged birds of passage
crowding towards the coast in order for their departure: but it was
very extraordinary that I never saw a red-start, white-throat, black-
cap, uncrested wren, fly-catcher, etc. And I remember to have
made the same remark in former years, as I usually come to this
place annually about this time. The birds most common along the
coast at present are the stone-chatters, whin-chats, buntings,
linnets, some few wheatears, titlarks, etc. Swallows and house-
martins abound yet, induced to prolong their stay by this soft, still,
dry season.

A land-tortoise, which has been kept for thirty years in a little
walled court belonging to the house where I now am visiting,
retires under ground about the middle of November, and comes
forth again about the middle of April. When it first appears in the
spring it discovers very little inclination towards food; but in the
height of summer grows voracious: and then as the summer
declines its appetite declines; so that for the last six weeks in
autumn it hardly eats at all. Milky plants, such as lettuces,
dandelions, sow-thistles, are its favourite dish. In a neighbouring
village one was kept till by tradition it was supposed to be an
hundred years old. An instance of vast longevity in such a poor
reptile!

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