134 THE NATURAL HISTORY 



been so from time immemorial : and smile at your simplicity if 

 you ask them whether the situation of these two different breeds 

 might not be reversed ? However, an intelligent friend of mine 

 near Chichester is determined to try the experiment ; and has 

 this autumn, at the hazard of being laughed at, introduced a 

 parcel of black-faced hornless rams among his horned western 

 ewes. The black-faced poll-sheep have the shortest legs and 

 the finest wool. 



As I had hardly ever before travelled these downs at so late 

 a season of the year, I was determined to keep as sharp a look- 

 out as possible so near the southern coast, with respect to the 

 summer short-winged birds of passage. We make great inquiries 

 concerning the withdrawing of the swallow kind, without ex- 

 amining enough into the causes why this tribe is never to be seen 

 in winter : for, entre nous, the disappearing of the latter is more 

 marvellous than that of the former, and much more unaccountable. 

 The hirundines, if they please, are certainly capable of migration ; 

 and yet no doubt are often found in a torpid state : but redstarts, 

 nightingales, white-throats, black-caps, &c., &c., are very ill pro- 

 vided for long flights ; have never been once found, as I ever 

 heard of, in a torpid state, and yet can never be supposed, in 

 such troops, from year to year to dodge and elude the eyes of the 

 curious and inquisitive, which from day to day discern the other 

 small birds that are known to abide our winters. But, notwith- 

 standing all my care, I saw nothing like a summer bird of 

 passage : l and, what is more strange, not one wheat-ear, though 

 they abound so in the autumn as to be a considerable perquisite to 

 the shepherds that take them ; and though many are to be seen 

 to my knowledge all the winter through in many parts of the 

 south of England. The most intelligent shepherds tell me that 

 some few of these birds appear on the downs in March, and then 

 withdraw to breed probably in warrens and stone-quarries : now 

 and then a nest is plowed up in a fallow on the downs under a 

 furrow, but it is thought a rarity. At the time of wheat-harvest 

 they begin to be taken in great numbers ; are sent for sale in 

 vast quantities to Brighthelmstone and Tunbridge ; and appear at 



1 [White dates this letter December 9, but does not tell us the day on which he 

 rode along the downs. If it was in December, the absence of the summer migrants 

 is of course natural. For the wheatear, see note on Letter XXXIX. to Pennant ; 

 the statement below, at the end of this paragraph, that they are not taken west of 

 the Arun, if it means that they are not found, is of course erroneous. Wheatears 

 are common all along the south coast.] 



