OF SELBORNE 131 



Thus an hen, just become a mother, is no longer that 

 placid bird she used to be, but with feathers standing 

 on end, wings hovering, and clocking note, she runs 

 about like one possessed. Dams will throw themselves 

 in the way of the greatest danger in order to avert it 

 from their progeny. Thus a partridge will tumble along 

 before a sportsman in order to draw away the dogs 

 from her helpless covey. In the time of nidification 

 the most feeble birds will assault the most rapacious. All 

 the hirundines of a village are up in arms at the sight of an 

 hawk, whom they will persecute till he leaves that district. 

 A very exact observer has often remarked that a pair 

 of ravens nesting in the rock of Gibraltar would suffer no 

 vulture or eagle to rest near their station, but would drive 

 them from the hill with an amazing fury : even the blue 

 thrush at the season of breeding would dart out from the 

 clefts of the rocks to chase away the kestril, or the 

 sparrow-hawk. If you stand near the nest of a bird that 

 has young, she will not be induced to betray them by 

 an inadvertent fondness, but will wait about at a distance 

 with meat in her mouth for an hour together. 



Should I farther corroborate what I have advanced 

 above by some anecdotes which I probably may have 

 mentioned before in conversation, yet you will, I trust, 

 pardon the repetition for the sake of the illustration. 



The flycatcher of the Zoology (the stoparola of Ray), 

 builds every year in the vines that grow on the walls of my 

 house. A pair of these little birds had one year inadver- 

 tendy placed their nest on a naked bough, perhaps in 

 a shady time, not being aware of the inconvenience that 

 followed. But an hot sunny season coming on before the 

 brood was half fledged, the reflection of the wall became 

 insupportable, and must inevitably have destroyed the 

 tender young, had not afi^ection suggested an expedient, 

 and prompted the parent-birds to hover over the nest 

 all the hotter hours, while with wings expanded, and 

 mouths gaping for breath, they screened off the heat from 

 their suffering offspring. 



A farther instance I once saw of notable sagacity in 



