X.] OF SELBORNE. 33 



to you as it is strange to me. " Though mutilated, such as you 

 would say it had formerly been, seeing that the remains are 

 what they are," " qualem dices . . . antehac fuisse, tales cum sinl 

 reliquiae ! " 



It haunted a marshy piece of ground in quest of wild ducks 

 and snipes ; but when it was shot, had just knocked down a rook, 

 which it was tearing in pieces. I cannot make it answer to any 

 of our English hawks ; neither could I find any like it at the 

 curious exhibition of stuffed birds in Spring Gardens. I found 

 it nailed up at the end of a barn, which is the countryman's 

 museum. 



The parish I live in is a very abrupt, uneven country, full of 

 hills and woods, and therefore full of birds. 



A iigust 4, 1767. 



[In severe weather, fieldfares, redwings, skylarks, and tit- 

 larks resort to watered meadows for food; the latter wades up 

 to its belly in pursuit of the pupfe of insects, and runs along 

 upon the floating grass and weeds. Many gnats are on the 

 snow near the water; these support the birds in part. 



Birds are much influenced in their choice of food by colour, 

 for though white currants are a much sweeter fruit than red, yet 

 they seldom touch the former till they have devoured every 

 bunch of the latter. 



Redstarts, fly-catchers, and blackcaps arrive early in April. 

 If these little delicate beings are birds of passage, how could 

 they, feeble as they seem, bear up against such storms of snow 

 and rain, and make their way through such meteorous turbu- 

 lences 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 frosts and 

 winds return to their stations periodically, as if they had met 

 with nothing to obstruct them. The withdrawing and reappear- 

 ance 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 



VOL. I. F 



