NA TURAL HISTOR Y OF SELBORNE. 141 



difficulty and hazard that birds must run in their migrations, by 

 reason of vast oceans, cross winds, &c. ; because, if we reflect, a 

 bird may travel from England to the Equator without launching out 

 and exposing itself to boundless seas, and that by crossing the 

 water at Dover, and again at Gibraltar. And I with the more con- 

 fidence advance this obvious remark, because my brother has 

 always found that some of his birds, and particularly the swallow 

 kind, are very sparing of their pains in crossing the Mediterranean ; 

 for when Arrived at Gibraltar they do not 



" Rang'd in figure wedge their way, 



And set forth 



Their airy caravan high over seas 

 Flying, and over lands with mutual wing 

 Easing their flight :" . . . . MILTON. 



but scout and hurry along in little detached parties of six or seven 

 in a company ; and sweeping low, just over the surface of the land 

 and water, direct tReir course to the opposite continent at the 

 narrowest passage they can find. They usually slope across the 

 bay to the south-west, and so pass over opposite to Tangier, which, 

 it seems, is the narrowest space. 



In former letters we have considered whether it was probable 

 that woodcocks in moonshiny nights cross the German ocean from 

 Scandinavia. As a proof that birds of less speed may pass that 

 sea, considerable as it is, I shall relate the following incident, 

 which, though mentioned to have happened so many years ago, was 

 strictly matter of fact : As some people were shooting in the 

 parish of Trotton, in the county of Sussex, they killed a duck in 

 that dreadful winter, 1708-9, with a silver collar about its neck,* on 

 which were engraven the arms of the king of Denmark. This 

 anecdote the rector of Trotton at that time has often told to a near 

 relation of mine ; and, to the best of my remembrance, the collar 

 was in the possession of the rector. 



At present I do not know anybody near the sea-side that will 

 take the trouble to remark at what time of the moon woodcocks 

 first come ; if I lived near the sea myself I would soon tell you more 

 of the matter. One thing I used ij observe when I was a sports- 

 man, that there were times in which woodcocks were so sluggish 

 and sleepy that they would drop again when flushed just before the 

 spaniels, nay, just at the muzzle of a gun that had been fired at 



'* J have read a like anecdote of a swan." 



