70 NATURAL HISTORY 



channel. What Hasselquist says on that subject is 

 remarkable : there were little short-winged birds fre- 

 quently coming on board his ship all the way from 

 our channel quite up to the Levant, especially before 

 squally weather. 



What you suggest, with regard to Spain, is highly 

 probable. The winters of Andalusia are so mild, that, 

 in all likelihood, the soft-billed birds that leave us at 

 that season may find insects sufficient to support them 

 there. 



Some young man, possessed of fortune, health, and 

 leisure, should make an autumnal voyage into that 

 kingdom ; and should spend a year there, investigating 

 the natural history of that vast country. Mr. Wil- 

 lughby 7 passed through that kingdom on such an 

 errand ; but he seems to have skirted along in a super- 

 ficial manner and an ill humour, being much disgusted 

 at the rude dissolute manners of the people. 



I have no friend left now at Sunbury to apply to 

 about the swallows roosting on the aits of the Thames: 

 nor can I hear any more about those birds which I sus- 

 pected were Merulce torquatce. 



As to the small mice, I have farther to remark, that 

 though they hang their nests for breeding up amidst 

 the straws of the standing corn, above the ground, yet 

 I find that, in the winter, they burrow deep in the earth, 

 and make warm beds of grass : but their grand rendez- 

 vous seems to be in corn-ricks, into which they are 

 carried at harvest. A neighbour housed an oat-rick 

 lately, under the thatch of which were assembled near 

 a hundred, most of which were taken ; and some I saw. 

 I measured them ; and found that, from nose to tail, 

 they were just two inches and a quarter, and their tails 

 just two inches long. Two of them, in a scale, weighed 

 down just one copper halfpenny, which is about the 

 third of an ounce avoirdupois : so that I suppose they 



7 See Ray's Travels, p. 460. 



