NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE. 85 



and autumn, seeming to advance in pairs towards the north- 

 ward, for the sake of breeding during the summer months, 

 and retiring in parties and broods towards the south at the 

 decline of the year : so that the rock of Gibraltar is the 

 great rendezvous and place of observation from whence 

 they take their departure . each way towards Europe or 

 Africa. It is therefore no mean discovery, I think, to find 

 that our small short-winged summer birds of passage are to 

 be seen spring and autumn on the very skirts of Europe ; 

 it is presumptive proof of their emigrations. 



Scopoli seems to me to have found the Hirundo melba, 

 the great Gibraltar swift, in Tyrol, without knowing it. 

 For what is his Hirundo alpina but the afore-mentioned 

 bird in other words ? Says he u Omnia prioris " (meaning 

 the swift) ; " sed pectus album ; paulo major prior e." I do 

 not suppose this to be a new species. It is true also of the 

 melba, that u nidificat in excelsis Alpium rupibus." Vide 

 Annum Primum. 



My Sussex friend, a man of observation and good sense, 

 but no naturalist, to whom I applied on account of the stone- 

 curlew, oedicnemus, sends me the following account : 

 " In looking over my Naturalist's Journal for the month of 

 April, I find the stone-curlews are first mentioned on the 

 seventeenth and eighteenth, which date seems to me rather 

 late. They live with us all the spring and summer, and at 

 the beginning of autumn prepare to take leave by getting 

 together in flocks. They seem to me a bird of passage that 

 may travel into some dry hilly country south of us, 

 probably Spain, because of the abundance of sheep-walks in 

 that country j for they spend their summers with us in such 

 districts. This conjecture I hazard, as I have never met 

 with any one that has seen them in England in the winter. 

 I believe they are not fond of going near the water, but 



