i62 The Natural History 



LETTER XXII 



TO THE HONOURABLE DAINES BARRINGTON 



Selborne, Sept. 13, 1774. 



Dear Sir, 



By means of a straight cottage chimney I had an 

 opportunity this summer of remarking, at my leisure, how 

 swallows ascend and descend through the shaft ; but my 

 pleasure, in contemplating the address with which this 

 feat was performed to a considerable depth in the 

 chimney, was somewhat interrupted by apprehensions 

 lest my eyes might undergo the same fate with those of 

 Tobit.i 



Perhaps it may be some amusement to you to hear at 

 what times the different species of hirufidmes arrived this 

 spring in three very distant counties of this kingdom. 

 With us the swallow was seen first on April the 4th, the 

 swift on April the 24th, the bank-martin on April the 12th, 

 and the house-martin not till April the 30th. At South 

 Zele, Devonshire, swallows did not arrive till April the 

 25th; swifts, in plenty, on May the ist; and house- 

 martins not till the middle of May. At Blackburn, in 

 Lancashire, swifts were seen April the 28th, swallows 

 April the 29th, house-martins May the ist. Do these 

 different dates, in such distant districts, prove anything 

 for or against migration? 



A farmer, near Weyhill, fallows his land with two teams 

 of asses ; one of which works till noon, and the other in 

 the afternoon. When these animals have done their 

 work, they are penned, all night, like sheep, on the fallow. 

 In the winter they are confined and foddered in a yard, 

 and make plenty of dung. 



Linnceus says that hawks ^'' pacisamtiir ifiducias aim 

 avibus^ quauidiu ciiadus cuculat " : but it appears to me 

 that, during that period, many little birds are taken and 



^ Tobit ii. 10. 



