of Selborne 207 



of his chickens by a sparrow-hawk, that came gliding 

 down between a faggot-pile and the end of his house to 

 the place where the coops stood. The owner, inwardly 

 vexed to see his flock thus diminishing, hung a setting 

 net adroitly between the pile and the house, into which 

 the caitiff dashed and was entangled. Resentment 

 suggested the law of retaliation ; he therefore clipped 

 the hawk's wings, cut off his talons, and, fixing a cork 

 on his bill, threw him down among the brood-hens. 

 Imagination cannot paint the scene that ensued ; the 

 expressions that fear, rage, and revenge, inspired, were 

 new, or at least such as had been unnoticed before : the 

 exasperated matrons upbraided, they execrated, they 

 insulted, they triumphed. In a word, they never desisted 

 from buffeting their adversary till they had torn him in 

 an hundred pieces. 



LETTER XLIV 



TO THE HONOURABLE DAINES BARRINGTON 



Selborne. 

 . . . "monstrent. . . . 



Quid tanlilm Oceano properent se tingere soles 

 Hyberni ; vel quae tardis mora noctibus obstet." 



Gentlemen who have outlets might contrive to make 

 ornament subservient to utility; a pleasing eye-trap might 

 also contribute to promote science : an obelisk in a 

 garden or park might be both an embellishment and an 

 heliotrope. 



Any person that is curious, and enjoys the advantage 

 of a good horizon, might, with little trouble, make two 

 heliotropes; the one for the winter, the other for the 

 summer solstice : and these two erections might be con- 

 structed with very little expense ;for two pieces of timber 

 frame-work, about ten or twelve feet high, and four feet 

 broad at the base, and close lined with plank, would 

 answer the purpose. 



