OF SELBORNE 29 



I acquiesce entirely in your opinion that, though most of the 

 swallow kind may migrate, yet that some do stay behind and 

 hide with us during the winter. 



As to the short-winged soft-billed birds, which come trooping 

 in such numbers in the spring, I am at a loss even what to sus- 

 pect about them. I watched them narrowly this year, and saw 

 them abound till about Michaelmas, when they appeared no 

 longer. Subsist they cannot openly among us, and yet elude the 

 eyes of the inquisitive : and, as to their hiding, no man pretends 

 to have found any of them in a torpid state in the winter. But 

 with regard to their migration, what difficulties attend that 

 supposition! that such feeble bad fliers (who the summer long 

 never flit but from hedge to hedge) should be able to traverse 

 vast seas and continents in order to enjoy milder seasons amidst 

 the regions of Africa I 



LETTER XIII. 



TO THE SAME. 



Selborne, Jan. 22, 1768. 

 SIR, 



As in one of your former letters you expressed the more satis- 

 faction from my correspondence on account of my living in the 

 most southerly county ; so now I may return the compliment, 

 and expect to have my curiosity gratified by your living much 

 more to the North. 



For many years past I have observed that towards Christmas 

 vast flocks of chaffinches have appeared in the fields ; many 

 more, I used to think, than could be hatched in any one neigh- 

 bourhood. But, when I came to observe them more narrowly, 

 I was amazed to find that they seemed to me to be almost 

 all hens. 1 I communicated my suspicions to some intelligent 

 neighbours, who, after taking pains about the matter, declared 

 that they also thought them all mostly females ; at least fifty to 

 one. This extraordinary occurrence brought to my mind the 

 remark of Linnaeus; that " before winter all their hen chaffinches 



1 [See the fourth edition of Yarrell's British. Birds, vol. ii., p. 70 f., where the 

 question is discussed of the separation of the sexes of the chaffinch in winter. This 

 separation is only " partial and temporary " (H. Saunders), but has given the bird 

 its specific name (Fringilla coelebs). See Letter VIII. to Harrington.] 



