The Natural History of Selborne 87 



bird, and feeds on haws ; but last autumn (when there were no haws) 

 it fed on yew-berries : in the spring it feeds on ivy-berries, which 

 ripen only at that season, in March and April. 



I must not omit to tell you (as you have been so lately on the 

 study of reptiles) that my people, every now and then of late, draw 

 up with a bucket of water from my well, which is sixty-three feet 

 deep, a large black warty lizard J with a fin-tail and yellow belly. 

 How they first came down at that depth, and how they were ever to 

 have got out thence without help, is more than I am able to say. 



My thanks are due to you for your trouble and care in the 

 examination of a buck's head. As far as your discoveries reach at 

 present, they seem much to corroborate my suspicions ; and I hope 



Mr. may find reason to give his decision in my favour ; and 



then, I think, we may advance this extraordinary provision of nature 

 as a new instance of the wisdom of God in the creation. 



As yet I have not quite done with my history of the cedicnemus, or 

 stone-curlew ; for I shall desire a gentleman in Sussex (near whose 

 house these birds congregate in vast flocks in the autumn) to observe 

 nicely when they leave him (if they do leave him), and when they 

 return again in the spring : I was with this gentleman lately, and 

 saw several single birds. 



1 This was, no doubt, a Great Crested Newt. ED. 



