OF SELBOENE 81 



In 1772 there were young house-martins 1 in their nest till 

 October the twenty-third. 



The swift 2 appears about ten or twelve days later than the house- 

 swallow : viz. about the twenty-fourth or twenty-sixth of April. 



Whin-chats and stone-cliatters 3 stay with us the whole year. 4 



Some wheat-ears 5 continue with us the winter through. 6 



Wagtails, all sorts, remain with us all the winter. 7 



Bullfinches, 8 when fed on hempseed, often become wholly 

 black. 



We have vast flocks of female chaffinches 9 all the winter, with 

 hardly any males among them. 



When you say that in breeding-time the cock-snipes 10 make a 

 bleating noise, and I a drumming (perhaps I should have rather 

 said an humming), I suspect we mean the same thing. However, 

 while they are playing about on the wing they certainly make a 

 loud piping with their mouths : but whether that bleating or 

 humming is ventriloquous, or proceeds from the motion of their 

 wings, I cannot say ; but this I know, that when this noise 

 happens the bird is always descending, and his wings are 

 violently agitated. 11 



Soon after the lapwings 12 have done breeding they congregate, 

 and, leaving the moors and marshes, betake themselves to downs 

 and sheep-walks. 



Two years ago 18 last spring the little auk 14 was found alive and 

 unhurt, but fluttering and unable to rise, in a lane a few miles 



I [Brit. ZooL, vol. ii., p.] 244. 2 245. 3 270, 271. 



4 As the whinchat (Pratincola rubelra, L. ) does not remain with us in winter, 

 as do a considerable number of stonechats (P. rubicola, L.), Mr. Harting has aptly 

 suggested that White may have mistaken female stonechats for whinchats, a not 

 unlikely blunder for one unprovided with a field-glass.] 



5 [Brit. ZooL, vol. ii., p.] 269. 6 [The wheatear migrates regularly.] 



7 [See note on Letter XIII. to Pennant.] 



8 [Brit. ZooL, vol. ii., p.] 300. 9 306. 10 358. 



II [" I have observed the drumming of snipes in bright days at the beginning of 

 April, and I could very clearly discern the manner in which the sound is produced. 

 After rising high and crying //, peet,peet, which is the snipe's vernal note, it lets 

 itself drop obliquely through the air, keeping the wings motionless, but turning by 

 some muscular contraction each individual quill sideways in the same manner that 

 the bars of a Venetian blind are turned to admit more light, and having descended 

 to the customary point, it readjusts its feathers and rises again obliquely without 

 sound. They will continue for hours together amusing themselves in this manner 

 upon a mild day, and when they are in this mood the sportsman has very little 

 chance of getting near them." Herbert, in Bennett 's ed.~\ 



12 [Brit. ZooL, vol. ii., p.] 360. 409. 



14 [Mergulus alle, L. , not uncommonly driven southward and inland in stormy 

 winters from its northern haunts.] 



6 



