76 NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE. 



And here, I think, will be the proper place to mention that those 

 birds were most punctual again in their migration this autumn, 

 appearing, as before, about the 3oth of September ; but their flocks 

 were larger than common, and their stay protracted somewhat 

 beyond the usual time. If they came to spend the whole winter 

 with us, as some of their congeners do, and then left us, as they do, 

 in spring, I should not be so much struck with the occurrence, since 

 it would be similar to that of the other winter birds of passage ; 

 but when I see them for a fortnight at Michaelmas, and again for 

 about a week in the middle of April, I am seized with wonder, and 

 long to be informed whence these travellers come, and whither they 

 go, since they seem to use our hills merely as an inn or baiting 

 place. 



SNOW-FLECK. 



Your account of the greater brambling, or snow-fleck, is very 

 amusing ; and strange it is that such a short-winged bird should 

 delight in such perilous voyages over the northern ocean ! Some 

 country people in the winter-time have every now and then told me 

 that they have seen two or three white larks on our downs ; but, on 

 considering the matter, I begin to suspect that these are some 



Macgillivray and Dr. Greville observed a male on Ben-na Mac-Dui on the 4th of August, 

 and some days after a brood was observed on Lochnagar, but these are only exceptions, 

 and no rule for the general breeding of the species in the north of Scotland. The white 

 hare is the It-pus variabilis, a northern species, but very common in the higher parts f 

 the highlands of Scotland ; in summer the fur is of a bluish grey, and in some districts 

 they are called "blue hares." It differs in habits from the common hare by making its 

 retreat among rocks or large loose stones. The eagle owl is now admitted into most works 

 on British ornithology, but its right to stand as a British species depends only on a few 

 instances of its capture, and on one or two records of its appearance. 



