NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 53 



his minutes, with respect to birds that settled on their 

 rigging during their voyage up or down the channel. 

 What Hasselquist says on that subject is remarkable ; there 

 were little short-winged birds frequently coming on board 

 his ship all the way from our channel quite up to the 

 Levant, especially before squally weather. 



What you suggest, with regard to Spain, is highly 

 probable. The winters of Andalusia are so mild, that, in 

 all likelihood, the soft-billed birds that leave us at that 

 season may find insects sufficient to support them there. 



Some young man, possessed of fortune, health, and 

 leisure, should make an autumnal voyage into that 

 kingdom ; and should spend a year there, investigating 

 the natural history of that vast country. Mr. Willughby l 

 passed through that kingdom on such an errand ; but he 

 seems to have skirted along in a superficial manner and 

 an ill-humour, being much disgusted at the rude, dissolute 

 manners of the people. 



I have no friend left now at Sunbury to apply to about 

 the swallows roosting on the aits of the Thames : nor can 

 I hear any more about those birds which I suspected were 

 merulce torquatce. 



As to the small mice, I have farther to remark, that 

 though they hang their nests for breeding up amidst the 

 straws of the standing corn, above the ground ; yet I find 

 that, in the winter, they burrow deep in the earth, and 

 make warm beds of grass : but their grand rendezvous 

 seems to be in corn-ricks, into which they are carried at 

 harvest. A neighbour housed an oat-rick lately, under 

 the thatch of which were assembled near an hundred, 

 most of which were taken ; and some I saw. I measured 

 them ; and found that, from nose to tail, they were just two 

 inches and a quarter, and their tails just two inches long. 

 Two of them, in a scale, weighed down just one copper 

 half-penny, which is about the third of an ounce avoir- 

 dupois : so that I suppose they are the smallest quad- 

 rupeds in this island. A full-grown Mus ntedius domesticus 

 1 See " Ray's Travels," p. 466. [G. W.] 



