30 THE NATURAL HISTORY 



"migrate through Holland into Italy ". Now I want to know, from 

 some curious person in the north, whether there are any large 

 flocks of these finches with them in the winter, and of which sex 

 they mostly consist ? For, from such intelligence, one might be 

 able to judge whether our female flocks migrate from the other 

 end of the island, or whether they come over to us from the 

 continent. 



We have, in the winter, vast flocks of the common linnets ; 

 more, I think, than can be bred in any one district. These, I 

 observe, when the spring advances, assemble on some tree in the 

 sunshine, and join all in a gentle sort of chirping, as if they were 

 about to break up their winter quarters and betake themselves to 

 their proper summer homes. It is well known, at least, that the 

 swallows and the fieldfares do congregate with a gentle twittering 

 before they make their respective departure. 



You may depend on it that the bunting, emberiza miliaria, does 

 not leave this country in the winter. In January 1767, I saw 

 several dozen of them, in the midst of a severe frost, among the 

 bushes on the downs near Andover : in our woodland enclosed 

 district it is a rare bird. 1 



Wagtails, both white and yellow, are with us all the winter. 2 

 Quails crowd to our southern coast, and are often killed in numbers 

 by people that go on purpose. 



Mr. Stillingjleet, in his Tracts, says that "if the wheatear 

 " (cenanthe) does not quit England, it certainly shifts places ; for 

 " about harvest they are not to be found, where there was before 

 "great plenty of them". This well accounts for the vast 

 quantities that are caught about that time on the south downs 

 near Lewes, where they are esteemed a delicacy. There have 

 been shepherds, I have been credibly informed, that have made 

 many pounds in a season by catching them in traps. And though 



1 [The common bunting is almost exclusively a bird of the corn lands, and there- 

 fore rare at Selborne. Bell notes on this passage that the cirl bunting (Emberiza 

 cirlus, L. ) is now resident in the district. Whether it was to be found there in 

 White's time we cannot guess ; it was not known as a British bird till the year 

 1800. White, in spite of his occasional deafness (see Letter XXII. to Barrington), 

 seems to have been quicker with his ears than with his eyes in observing birds, but 

 it is quite possible that he failed to distinguish the song of the cirl bunting from 

 that of the yellow hammer. Even with our knowledge of the voices and appearance 

 of the two species, it is not always easy to distinguish them at a glance.] 



2 [By "yellow wagtail" White must here mean the grey wagtail (Motacilla 

 melanope, Pall. ), as the yellow wagtail (M. raii, Bonap. ) never winters in England. 

 The so-called grey species shows much sulphur yellow on its under parts. But 

 White has little to tell us of the wagtails, and evidently had not bent his mind to 

 observe them closely.] 



