The Natural History of Selborne 407 



frequently contracts a rank unpleasant taste from their having lately 

 fed on strong marshy aquatic plants, as I suppose. 



That the leaves of vegetables are wholesome and conducive to the 

 health of birds seems probable, for many people fat their ducks and 

 turkeys with the leaves of lettuce chopped small. MARKWICK. 



HEN-HARRIER. 



A NEIGHBOURING gentleman sprung a pheasant in a wheat stubble, 

 and shot at it ; when, notwithstanding the report of the gun, it was 

 immediately pursued by the blue hawk, known by the name of the 

 hen-harrier, but escaped into some covert. He then sprung a second, 

 and a third, in the same field, that got away in the same manner : the 

 hawk hovering round him all the while that he was beating the field, 

 conscious no doubt of the game that lurked in the stubble. Hence 

 we may conclude that this bird of prey was rendered very daring and 

 bold by hunger, and that hawks cannot always seize their game when 

 they please. We may farther observe, that they cannot pounce their 

 quarry on the ground where it might be able to make a stout resist- 

 ance, since so large a fowl as a pheasant could not but be visible to 

 the piercing eye of a hawk, when hovering over the field. Hence 

 that propensity of cowering and squatting till they are almost trod 

 on, which no doubt was intended as a mode of security ; though long 

 rendered destructive to the whole race of gallinas by the invention of 

 nets and guns. WHITE. 



Of the great boldness and rapacity of birds of prey when urged on 

 by hunger, I have seen several instances ; particularly, when shooting 

 in the winter in company with two friends, a woodcock flew across 

 us, closely pursued by a small hawk : we all three fired at the wood- 

 cock instead of the hawk, which, notwithstanding the report of three 

 guns close by it, continued its pursuit of the woodcock, struck it 

 down, and carried it off, as we afterwards discovered. 



At another time, when partridge-shooting with a friend, we saw a 



