NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE. 67 



TO THOMAS PENNANT, ESQUIRE. 



THE NATURALIST'S SUMMER-EVENING WALK 



-" equidem credo, quia sit divinitus illis 



Ingenium." VIRG. Georg. 



WHEN day declining sheds a milder gleam, 



What time the May-fly* haunts the pool or stream ; 



When the still owl skims round the grassy mead, 



What time the timorous hare limps forth to feed ; 



Then be the time to steal adown the vale, 



And listen to the vagrantf cuckoo's tale ; 



To hear the clamorous { curlew call his mate, 



Or the soft quail his tender pain relate ; 



To see the swallow sweep the darkening plain 



Belated, to support her infant train ; 



To mark the swift in rapid giddy ring 



Dash round the steeple, unsubdued of wing ; 



Amusive birds ! say where your hid retreat 



When the frost rages and the tempests beat \ 



Whence your return, by such nice instinct led, 



When spring, soft season, lifts her bloomy head ? 



Such baffled searches mock man's prying pride, 



The GOD of NATURE is your secret guide ! 



* The angler's May-fly, the ephemera vulgata LINN., comes forth 

 from its aurelia state, and emerges out of the water about six in the 

 evening, and dies about eleven at night, determining the date of its 

 fly state in about five or six hours. They usually begin to appear about 

 the 4th June, and continue in succession for near a fortnight. See 

 Swammerdam, Derham, ScopoH, etc. 



t Vagrant cuckoo ; so called because, being tied down by no 

 incubation or attendance about the nutrition of its young, it wandera 

 without control. 



J Charadrius cedlcnemus. 



