870 M. Necker on the Birds of Geneva. 



place of winging their flight to more genial climates, they re- 

 mained torpid in holes, or sunk in clusters to the bottom of 

 lakes — that instances had occurred, where birds thus situated, 

 were revived from their torpid sleep by the application of 

 gentle heat — and the improbability of the continued flight of 

 birds over such an amazing extent of space, was held as giv- 

 ing weight to the theory which asserted their hyemal torpidi- 

 ty. Other naturalists, from the periodical disappearance of 

 many of the feathered tribes, — the fact of their being frequently 

 met with in flocks in a half-exhausted state at sea — and even 

 observed at times corresponding with their disappearance in 

 Europe on the continent of Africa — with more justice con- 

 cluded, that our annual visitors, led by unerring instinct, come 

 thither for the great purpose of propagating their species 

 in safety, and return, undirected by compass, across the ocean, 

 by the same instinctive impulse, to more genial climes, when 

 the approach of winter threatens to deprive them of their 

 usual food. 



5 What M. Necker has done in regard to the birds which 

 frequent the neighbourhood of Geneva, has been ably per- 

 formed by Mr William Markwick for those which visit Eng- 

 land. In a paper read before the Linnean Society of Lon- 

 don on the 3d of February 1789, and which was published in 

 the first volume of their Transactions, Mr Markwick has 

 given the results of his personal observation on the appear- 

 ance and disappearance of birds for a period of sixteen years, 

 vii;. from 1768 to 1783, and has embodied these results in a 

 tabular form, somewhat similar to the Ornithological Calendar 

 of M. Necker. Mr Markwick was induced to make his ob- 

 servations public, from the idea that many authors who have 

 written on the subject, did so, not from their own observation, 

 but from the vague accounts, and imperfect observation of 

 others. Catfield, the place where these observations were 

 made, is situated near Battle, in Sussex, about five miles from 

 the sea, in a country finely diversified with hill and dale ; 

 and though there is no large river near it, yet there is much 

 oozy, springy ground, and many woods in the neighbourhood. 

 Were similar observations made in the different countries of 

 Europe, the islands of the Mediterranean, and on the nearest 



. 



