52 The Natural History 



owner has told me since, that, on recollection, he has 

 seen some of the same birds round his ponds in former 

 summers. 



The next bird that I procured (on the 21st of May) 

 was a male red-backed butcher bird, lariius collurio. My 

 neighbour, who shot it, says that it might easily have 

 escaped his notice, had not the outcries and chattering 

 of the white-throats and other small birds drawn his 

 attention to the bush where it was : its craw was filled 

 with the legs and wings of beetles. 



The next rare birds (which were procured for me last 

 week) were some ring-ousels, iiirdi torquati. 



This week twelve months a gentleman from London, 

 being with us, was amusing himself with a gun, and 

 found, he told us, on an old yew hedge where there were 

 berries, some birds like blackbirds, with rings of 

 white round their necks : a neighbouring farmer also at 

 the same time observed the same ; but, as no specimens 

 were procured little notice was taken. I mentioned this 

 circumstance to you in my letter of November the 4th, 

 1767 : (you, however, paid but small regard to what I 

 said, as I had not seen these birds myself:) but last 

 week, the aforesaid farmer, seeing a large flock, twenty or 

 thirty of these birds, shot two cocks and two hens : and 

 says, on recollection, that he remembers to have observed 

 these birds again last spring, about Lady-day, as it were, 

 on their return to the north. Now perhaps these ousels 

 are not the ousels of the north of England, but belong to 

 the more northern parts of Europe ; and may retire 

 before the excessive rigor of the frosts in those parts; 

 and return to breed in the spring, when the cold abates. 

 If this be the case, here is discovered a new bird of 

 winter passage, concerning whose migrations the writers 

 are silent : but if these birds should prove the ousels of 

 the north of England, then here is a migration disclosed 

 within our own kingdom never before remarked. It 

 does not yet appear whether they retire beyond the 

 bounds of our island to the south ; but it is most 

 probable that they usually do, or else one cannot suppose 

 that they would have continued so long unnoticed in the 



