NA TURAL HIS TOR Y OF SEL B ORNE. 1 2 5 



The latter has a surprising variety of notes resembling the song 

 of several other birds ; but then it has also an hurrying manner, 

 not at all to its advantage : it is notwithstanding a delicate 

 polyglot. 



It is new to me that titlarks in cages sing in the night ; perhaps 

 only caged birds do so. I once knew a tame redbreast in a cage 

 that always sang as long as candles were in the room ; but in their 

 wild state no one supposes they sing in the night. 



I should be almost ready to doubt the fact, that there are to be 

 seen much fewer birds in July than in any former month, notwith- 

 standing so many young are hatched daily. Sure I am that it is 

 far otherwise with respect to the swallow tribe, which increases 

 prodigiously as the summer advances : and I saw at the time 

 mentioned, many hundreds of young wagtails on the banks of the 

 Cherwell, which almost covered the meadows. If the matter 

 appears as you say in the other species, may it not be owing to 

 the dams being engaged in incubation, while the young are 

 concealed by the leaves ? 



Many times have I had the curiosity to open the stomachs of 

 woodcocks and snipes ; but nothing ever occurred that helped to 

 explain to me what their subsistence might be : all that I could 

 ever find was a soft mucus, among which lay many pellucid small 

 gravels. 



I am, &c, 



