64 



NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE. 



LETTER XX. To T. PENNANT, ESQ. 



Selborne, October S, 1768. 



IT is, I find, in zoology as it is in botany : all nature is so full, 

 that that district produces the greatest variety which is the most 

 examined. Several birds, which are said to belong to the north 

 only, are, it seems, often in the south. I have discovered this 

 summer three species of birds with us, which writers mention as 

 only to be seen in the northern counties. The first that was 

 brought me (on the 14th of May,) was the sandpiper, tringa 



six or eight in number, rather large for the size of the hird, semi-translucent white, thickly dotted 

 all over with dark reddish brown spots, which are sometimes confluent, and are generally thickest 

 at the large end ; they can never be confounded with those of the others. The young differ but 

 very little from their parents, and acquire their fixed colours before leaving us in the autumn, 

 not, as in the two other species, becoming of a uniform yellow on the under parts after moulting. 

 I suspect they never breed but once in the season. 



The warbling pettychaps (S. melodic), "yellow," or "willow-wren" of authors, is by far the 

 most abundant of the genus, haunting alike every situation : the fields and the woods, gardens 

 and the road-side, and the brambles and furze upon open and extensive commons. It is a trifle 

 smaller than the last species, and of a darker and more dingy colour, inclining to olive brown ; 

 the eye-streak, though tolerably'well defined, is smaller, 

 and not so bright, and the under tail-coverts are tinged 

 with yellow, those of the sibilous pettychaps being of 

 the-purest snow white ; its legs and feet are of a yellow- 

 brown, forming the most obvious distinctive character 

 between it and the chiflchaff pettychaps, in which latter 

 these are of a brownish black ; its wings are shorter than 

 in the former species, and longer than in the latter ; and 

 it is more a bush bird than either, less confined to the 

 vicinity of trees, but where there are trees is as com- 

 monly found upon them. It is eminently distinguished 

 from the others by its charming and truly melodious 

 song, which, however, consists but of a simple run of 

 notes, uttered in a descending scale, yet is extremely sweet and musical, and at times very pleas 

 ingly varied, contributing in no small degree to the cheerfulness of our vernal concert. I think 

 nothing can be more delightful than to lisfen-to these little vocalists, upon a fine sunny morning 

 iu April, when, just after their arrival in the country, thousands of them are everywhere singing 

 upon the furzes; and " a joyous, easy, laughing note" they have, as is well expressed by Mr. 

 White: callous and saturnine must he be who is not enlivened by it. At the season of incubation, 

 or rather after the exclusion of the young, this species also has a soft and plaintive cry (resembling 

 /mi, or rather heiree), when the nest is approached, and so clamorously is this repeated, and at 

 such a distance from the object of their care, that this monotonous plaint is not unfrequently the 

 only sound to be heard, as we traverse the woods upon a sultry day in summer. The young at 

 first closely resemble their parents; but, after moulting, have the eye-streak and whole under 

 parts of a much brighter and uniform yellow, which fades gradually into the mature hue. The 

 same also takes place in the next species, the adults of both being known in Surrey by the term 

 "grass-wren," and the moulted young ones by the name " golden-wren," which latter appellation 

 s not (as some have said) applied to the golden-crowned regulus. The warbling pettychaps moults 

 very early, having often completed its change of feathers by the end of July, at which time it 

 partially resumes its song; only partially, for it sings but occasionally, and rather weakly, in 

 autumn. The eggs vary more than those of the other species, but are in general easily enough 



Warbling Pettychaps. 



