90 CATS RETURN OF BIRDS. 



and will not, when they can avoid it, deign to wet a foot, much 

 less to plunge into that element.* 



Quadrupeds that prey on fish are amphibious ; such as the 

 otter, which by nature is so well formed for diving, that it 

 makes great havock among the inhabitants of the waters. Not 

 supposing that we had any of those beasts in our shallow 

 brooks, I was much pleased to see a male otter brought to 

 me, weighing twenty-one pounds, that had been shot on the 

 bank of our stream, below the Priory, where the rivulet divides 

 the parish of Selborne from Harteley Wood. 



LETTER XXXV. 



TO THE HON. DAINES BARRINGTON. 



SELBORNE, May 21, 1770. 



DEAR SIR, The severity and turbulence of last month so 

 interrupted the regular process of summer migration, that 

 some of the birds do but just begin to shew themselves, and 

 others are apparently thinner than usual ; as the white-throat, 

 the black-cap, the redstart, the fly-catcher. I well remember, 

 that, after the very severe spring, in the year 1739-40, summer 

 birds of passage were very scarce. They come probably 

 hither with a south-east wind, or when it blows between those 

 points ; but in that unfavourable year, the winds blew the 



* Many instances have been recorded of cats catching fish. Mr 

 Moody of Jesmond, near Newcastle-upon-Tyne, had a cat in 1829, which 

 had been in his possession for some years, that caught fish with great 

 assiduity, and frequently brought them home alive ! Besides minnows 

 and eels, she occasionally carried home pilchards, one of which, about 

 six inches long, was found in her possession in August, 1827. She also 

 contrived to teach a neighbour's cat to fish ; and the two have been seen 

 together watching by the TJis for fish. At other times, they have been 

 seen at opposite sides of the river, not far from each other, on the look 

 out for their prey. 



The following" still more extraordinary circumstance of a cat fishing in 

 the sea, appeared in the Plymouth Journal, June, 1828: 



" There is now at the battery on the Devil's Point, a cat, which is an 

 expert catcher of the finny tribe, being in the constant habit of diving 

 into the sea, and bringing up the fish alive in her mouth, and depositing 

 them in the guard-room, for the use of the soldiers. She is now seven 

 years old, and has long been a useful caterer. It is supposed that her 

 pursuit of the water-rats first taught her to venture into the water, to 

 which it is well known puss has a natural aversion. She is as fond of 

 the water as a Newfoundland dog, and takes her regular peregrinations 

 along the rocks at its edge, looking out for her prey, ready to dive for 

 them at a moment's notice. --ED. 



