OF SELBORNE. 181 
the tortoise retired into the ground under the he. 
patica. 
LETTER XIV. 
Selborne, March: 26, 1773. 
Dear Sir,—Tue more I retlect on the oropy7 
of animals, the more I am astonished at its effects. 
Nor is the violence of this affection more wonder. 
ful than the shortness of its duration. Thus every 
hen is in her turn the virago of the yard, in pro- 
portion to the helplessness of her brood, and will 
fly in the face of a dog or,sow in defence of those 
chickens which in a few weeks she will drive be. 
fore her with relentless cruelty. 
This affection sublimes the passions, quickens 
the invention, and sharpens the sagacity of the 
brute creation. Thus a hen, when she becomes a 
mother, is no longer that placid bird she used to be; 
but, with feathers standing on end, wings hovering, 
and clucking note, she runs about like one possess. 
ed. Dames will throw themselves in the way of the 
greatest danger in order to avert it from their pro- 
geny. ‘Thus a partridge will tumble along before 
_ a sportsman in order to draw away the dogs from 
her helpless covey.* In the time of niditication, 
the most feeble birds will assault the most rapa. 
* A hen partridge came out of a ditch, and ran along shivering 
with her wings, and crying out as if wounded and unable to 
get from us. While the dam acted this distress, the boy who 
attended me saw her brood, that was small and unable to fly, 
run for shelter into an old fox-earth under the bank. So wor 
derful a power is instinct.—-WuitE’s Observations on, Birds. 
