NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE. 81 



obligingly carried me to see many curious sights. As you 

 were then writing to him about horns, he carried me to see 

 many strange and wonderful specimens. There is, I re- 

 member, at Lord Pembroke's at Wilton, a horn, room 

 furnished with more than thirty different pairs ; but I have 

 not seen that house lately. 



Mr. Barrington showed me many astonishing collections 

 of stuffed and living birds from all quarters of the world. 

 After I had studied over the latter for a time, I remarked 

 that every species almost that came from distant regions, 

 such as South America, the coast of Guinea, etc., were 

 thick-billed birds of the loooia and fringilla genera ; and no 

 motacillce or muscicapas were to be met with. When I 

 came to consider, the reason was obvious enough ; for the 

 hard-billed birds subsist on seeds which are easily carried 

 on board ; while the soft-billed birds, which are supported 

 by worms and insects, or, what is a succedaneum for them, 

 fresh raw meat, can meet with neither in long and tedious 

 voyages. It is from this defect of food that our collections 

 (curious as they are) are defective, and we are deprived of 

 some of the most delicate and lively genera. 



LETTER XXXI. 



SELBORNE, Sept. Itih, 1770. 



You saw, I find, the ring-ousels again among their native 

 crags ; and are farther assured that they continue resident 

 in those cold regions the whole year. From whence then 

 do our ring-ousels migrate so regularly every September, 



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