428 OBSERVATIONS ON 



one species of buzzard Buteo apivorus sive vespivorus, 

 the honey buzzard, because some combs of wasps hap- 

 pened to be found in one of their nests. The combs 

 were conveyed thither doubtless for the sake of the 

 maggots or nymphs, and not for their honey : since 

 none is to be found in the combs of wasps. Birds of 

 prey occasionally feed on insects : thus have I seen a 

 tame kite picking up the female ants full of eggs with 

 much satisfaction *. 



1 That redstarts, flycatchers, blackcaps, and other slender-billed in- 

 sectivorous small birds, particularly the swallow tribe, make their first 

 appearance very early in the spring, is a well known fact; though the 

 flycatcher is the latest of them all in its visit (as this accurate naturalist 

 observes in another place), for it is never seen before the month of May. 

 If these delicate creatures come to us from a distant country, they will 

 probably be exposed in their passage, as Mr. White justly remarks, to 

 much greater difficulties from storms and tempests than their feeble 

 powers appear to be able to surmount : on the other hand, if we suppose 

 them to pass the winter in a dormant state in this country, concealed in 

 caverns or other hiding places sufficiently guarded from the extreme cold 

 of our winter to preserve their life, and that at the approach of spring 

 they revive from their torpid state and reassume their usual powers of 

 action, it will entirely remove the first difficulty, arising from the storms 

 and tempests they are liable to meet with in their passage ; but how are 

 we to get over the still greater difficulty of their revivification from their 

 torpid state ? What degree of warmth in the temperature of the air is 

 necessary to produce that effect, and how it operates on the functions of 

 animal life, are questions not easily answered *. 



How could Mr. White suppose that Ray named this species the honey 

 buzzard because it fed on honey, when he not only named it in Latin 

 Buteo apivorus sive vespivorus, but expressly says, that " it feeds on in- 

 sects, and brings up its young with the maggots or nymphs of wasps ?" 



That birds of prey, when in want of their proper food, flesh, sometimes 

 feed on insects I have little doubt, and think I have observed the com- 

 mon buzzard (Falco Buteo^) to settle on the ground and pick up insects 

 of some kind or other J. MARKWICK. 



* Little weight can be attached to this argument, the difficulty assumed 

 being so far from insurmountable, that it occurs equally in every case of 

 hybernation. E. T. B. 



t [Buteo vulgar is, BECHST.] 



t Mr. White observes, that birds of prey, as hawks, feed on insects. 

 There is reason to believe, that insects form also part of the food even of 

 the larger beasts of prey. " Beetles, flies, worms, form part of the lion and 

 tiger's food, as they do that of the fox." See Jarrold's Dissert, on Man. 

 MITFORD. 



