336 OBSERVATIONS 



birds of passage, (as we have reason to suppose they 

 are, because they are never seen in winter,) how 

 could they, feeble as they seem, bear up against 

 such storms of snow and rain, and make their way 

 through such meteorous turbulence, as one should 

 suppose would embarrass and retard the most hardy 

 and resolute of the winged nation ? Yet they keep 

 their appointed times and seasons ; and, in spite of 

 frost and winds, return to their stations periodically, 

 as if they had met with nothing to obstruct them. 

 The withdrawing and appearance of the short- winged 

 summer birds is a very puzzling circumstance in 

 natural history ! 



When the boys bring me wasps' nests, my bantam 

 fowls fare deliciously, and, when the combs are 

 pulled to pieces, devour the young wasps in their 

 maggot state with the highest glee and delight. 

 Any insect- eating bird would do the same; and 

 therefore I have often wondered that the accurate 

 Mr. Ray should call one species of buzzard buteo 

 apivorus sive vespivorus, or the honey-buzzard, because 

 some combs of wasps happened to be found in one of 

 their nests. The combs were conveyed thither doubt- 

 less for the sake of the maggots or nymphs, and not 

 for their honey; since none is to be found in the 

 combs of wasps. Birds of prey occasionally feed on 

 insects ; thus have I seen a tame kite picking up the 

 female ants full of eggs, with much satisfaction. 



WHITE. 



That redstarts, fly-catchers, black-caps, and other 

 slender-billed insectivorous small birds, particularly 

 the swallow tribe, make their first appearance very 

 early in the spring, is a well known fact; though 

 the fly- catcher is the latest of them all in its visit, 

 (as this accurate naturalist observes in another place,) 

 for it is never seen before the month of May. If 



