PASSERINE BIRDS. 173 



den under mosses, and lichens on large trees ; a third 

 upon coleopterous creatures, secreted in the hedge-row 

 and the coppice. The gray wagtail finds food with us all 

 the year ; but the yellow one must seek it in other 

 regions. The nightingale diets upon a peculiar grub, 

 and when that is not found in the state he prefers, he 

 departs. The domestic swallow feeds round our houses, 

 or in the meadow ; but the bank swallow never comes 

 near us, chases his food beneath the crag, and along the 

 stream. The swift prefers the higher ranges of the air, 

 dieting upon the flies that mount into those regions. 

 The goatsucker does not notice the creatures of the 

 day, capturing the moths and dorrs of the night. The 

 wheatear feeds only upon such insects as he finds upon 

 fallow lands, the down or the heath ; and thus almost 

 every individual might be characterized by some pro- 

 pensity of appetite, by some mode or place of feeding ; 

 and hence individuals are found as tenants of the home- 

 stead, the wild, the stream, the air, rock, down, and 

 grove in every place finding plenty, and fulfilling their 

 destination without rivalry or contention : nor perhaps 

 is there any race of creatures that associates more inno- 

 cently, or passes their lives more free from bickering 

 and strife, than these our land-birds do, persevering, from 

 period to period, with undeviating habits and propen- 

 sities, manifesting an original appointment and fixed 

 design of Providence, whose bounteous table, wherever 

 we look around, is spread for all, and good things meted 

 out to each by justice, weight, and measure. 



I am neither inclined to seek after, nor desirous of 

 detailing, the little annoyances that these wildings of 

 nature, in their hard struggles for existence, may occa- 

 sionally produce ; being fully persuaded that the petty 

 injuries we sometimes sustain from birds are at others 

 fully compensated by their services. We too often, 

 perhaps, notice the former, while the latter are remote, 

 or not obtrusive. I was this day (Jan. 25) led to reflect 

 upon the extensive injury that might be produced by 

 the agency of a very insignificant instrument, in ob- 

 serving the operations of the common bunting (emberiza 

 miliaris) ; a bird that seems to live principally, if not 

 P2 



