NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE. 



237 



appearance. Dabchicks, moor-hens, and coots, fly erect, with 

 their legs hanging down, and hardly make any dispatch ; the 

 reason is plain, their wings are placed too forward out of the 



THE COMMON COOT. 



true centre of gravity ; as the legs of auks and divers are situated 

 too backward. 



NOTE TO LETTER XLII. 



1 The flight of the heron seems particularly slow, yet the beats of its wings 

 average one hundred and twenty in a minute, and it makes very rapid progress. 



LETTER XLIII. 



SELBORNE, Sept. grh, 1778. 



DEAR SIR, From the motion of birds, the transition is natural 

 enough to their notes and language, of which I shall say some- 

 thing. Not that I would pretend to understand their language 

 like the vizier; who, by the recital of a conversation which passed 



