OF SELBORNE. 169 



that give it that forked shape ; with this difference, that 

 they are longer in the tail of the male than in that of 

 the female. 



Nightingales, when their young first come abroad, 

 and are helpless, make a plaintive and a jarring noise ; 

 and also a snapping or cracking, pursuing people along 

 the hedges as they walk : these last sounds seem in- 

 tended for menace and defiance. 



The grasshopper-lark chirps all night in the height of 

 summer. 



Swans turn white the second year, and breed the 

 third. 



Weasels prey on moles, as appears by their being 

 sometimes caught in mole-traps. 



Sparrow-hawks sometimes breed in old crows' nests, 

 and the kestril in churches and ruins. 



There are supposed to be two sorts of eels in the 

 island of Ely 1 . The threads sometimes discovered in 

 eels are perhaps their young : the generation of eels is 

 very dark and mysterious 2 . 



Hen-harriers breed on the ground, and seem never to 

 settle on trees. 



1 Three species of eels are now pretty clearly made out. Descriptions 

 and figures of them, with other particulars, have been given in the History 

 of British Fishes. W. Y. 



[See the note on page 50.] 



- Eels are infested by several kinds of intestinal worms, which are 

 doubtless the thread-like bodies referred to. But the situation in which 

 the parasites are found will generally be sufficient to indicate their true 

 nature : filiform bodies within the intestines of an eel can be nothing but 

 worms. Bodies of that form occurring externally to the intestines and 

 within the abdomen may still be regarded as worms that have escaped 

 from the intestinal cavity. And other worms, internal parasites, occur 

 naturally within the serous cavity of the abdomen. 



The reproduction of eels has been sedulously attended to for several 

 years by Mr. Yarrell, whose observations, recorded in the Zoological 

 Society's Proceedings, in Jesse's Gleanings in Natural History, and in 

 his own History of British Fishes, leave little doubt that these fishes 

 spawn in a manner similar to most of their class, the roe of the female 

 being filled with countless myriads of ova which are deposited in the 

 winter months.~E. T. B. 



