356 OBSERVATIONS 



the swift, as does also the period of their arrival. 

 Each species is usually seen about the beginning of 

 May , each breeds but once in a summer ; each lays 

 only two eggs. 



July 4, 1790. The woman who brought me two 

 fern-owl's eggs last year, on July 14, on this day 

 produced me two more, one of which had been laid 

 this morning, as appears plainly, because there was 

 only one in the nest the evening before. They were 

 found, as last July, on the verge of the Down above 

 the Hermitage, under a beechen shrub, on the naked 

 ground. Last year, those eggs were full of young, 

 and just ready to be hatched. 



These circumstances point out the exact time when 

 these curious nocturnal migratory birds lay their eggs 

 and hatch their young. Fern-owls, like snipes, stone- 

 curlews, and some other birds, make no nests. Birds 

 that build on the ground do not make much of 

 nests. WHITE. 



No author that I am acquainted with has given 

 so accurate and pleasing an account of the manners 

 and habits of the goat -sucker as Mr. White, taken 

 entirely from his own observations. Its being a noc- 

 turnal bird, has prevented my having many opportu- 

 nities of observing it. I suspect that it passes the 

 day in concealment amidst the dark and shady gloom 

 of deep-wooded dells, or, as they are called here, 

 gills ; having more than once seen ifr roused from 

 such solitary places by my dogs, when shooting in 

 the day-time. I have also sometimes seen it in an 

 evening, but not long enough to take notice of its 

 habits and manners. I have never seen it but in the 

 summer, between the months of May and September. 



MARKWICK. 



SAND-MARTINS. March 23, 1788. A gentle- 



