2.So STUDIES OF NATURE. 



of the animal. Many differtations have, as the 

 cuftom is, been compofed on this fubject., but no. 

 remedy for the evil has been propofed. 1 am 

 convinced there mull be birds in Lapland, which 

 would deliver the rein-deer from this formidable 

 infect, did not the Laplanders terrify them away 

 by the noife of their fowling-pieces. Thefe arms 

 of civilized Nations have overfpread with barba- 

 rifm all our plains. The birds, deflined to embel- 

 lilh the habitation of Man, withdraw from it, or 

 approach with timidity and miftruft. The found 

 of mufquetry ought to be prohibited, at leafl, 

 around the haunts of the harmlefs cattle. Whe^ 

 the birds are not feared away by the fowler, they 

 follow their inftincts, 



I have frequently feen in the Me of France, a 

 fpecies of ftarling, called martin, imported thither 

 from India, perch familiarly on the back and horns 

 of the oxen, to pick them clean. To this bird 

 that ifland ftands indebted, at the prefent day, for 

 the deftrudtion of the locufts, which, in former 

 times, committed fuch ravages upon it. In thofe. 

 of our European rural fcenes which (till exhibit, on 

 the part of Man, fome degree of hofpitality to- 

 ward the innocent warblers, he has the pleafure of 

 feeing the ftork build her neft on the ridge of his 

 houfe; the fwallow flutter about in his apart- 

 ments : and the wagtail, along the bank of the 



riverj 



