EING-OUSELS. 121 



common, for some were seen at the usual liill on tlie foiui;li 

 of tliis month. 



An obsenang Devonshire gentleman tells me, that they 

 frequent some parts of Dartmoor, and breed there, but leave 

 those haunts about the end of September, or beginning oi 

 October, and return again about the end of March. 



Another intelligent person assures me, that they breed in 

 great abundance all over the Peak of Derby, and are called 

 there tor-ousels, withdraw in October and November, and 

 return in spring. This information seems to throw some 

 light on my new migration. 



Scopoli's new work * (which I have just procured), has ita 

 merits, in ascertaining many of the birds of the Tyrol and 

 Carniola. Monographers, come from whence they may, have, 

 I think, fair pretence to challenge some regard and approba- 

 tion from the lovers of natural history ; for, as no man can 

 a.one investigate all the works of nature, these partial 

 writers may, each in his department, be more accurate in 

 their discoveries, and freer from errors, than more general 

 writers, and so by degrees may pave the way to an universal 

 correct natural history. Not that Scopoli is so circumstantial 

 and attentive to the life and conversation of his birds as I 

 could wish : he advances some false facts ; as when he says 

 of the hirundo urhica, that, ^^ pullos extra nidum non mitrit.^^ 

 This assertion I know to be wrong, from repeated observa- 

 tion this summer ; for house-martins do feed their young 

 flying, though, it must be acknowledged, not so commonly 

 as the house-swallow ; and the feat is done in so quick a 

 manner as not to be perceptible to indifferent observers. 

 He also advances some (I was going to say) improbable 

 facts ; as when he says of the woodcock that '■'■ pullos rostro 

 ^ortat fugiens ah hoste,'" — flying from the enemy it carries 

 ^ts young in its beak.f But candour forbids me to say 

 absolutely that any fact is false because I have never been 



* Anntts Primus Historico-Naturalis. 

 + It is an undoubted fact, of which I have had ample proof, that when 

 waodcocks breed in this country, they deposit their eggs on some dry bank, 

 and as soon as the young are hatched they are conveyed to the nearest swamp, 

 or wet place, where food can be procured. I am assured that this is done by 

 means of the beak of the old birds. I have the authority of the keeper cl 

 a friend of mine, who saw this mode of conveyance practiced. — Ed, 



