'Keed sparroiv 



LETTER VI. 



To //! same. 



SELBORNE, A/j> 2i.rf, 1770. 



EAR SIR, The severity and turbulence of 

 last month so interrupted the regular process 

 of summer migration, that some of the birds 

 do but just begin to show themselves, and 

 others are apparently thinner than usual ; as 

 the white-throat, the black-cap, the red-start, 

 the fly-catcher. I well remember that after 

 the very severe spring in the year 1739-40, summer birds of 

 passage were very scarce. They come probably hither with a 

 south-east wind, or when it blows between those points ; but 

 in that unfavourable year the winds blowed the whole spring 

 and summer through from the opposite quarters. And yet 

 amidst all these disadvantages two swallows, as I mentioned 

 in my last, appeared this year as early as the eleventh of 

 April amidst frost and snow ; but they withdrew again for a 

 time. 



I am not pleased to find that some people seem so little 



