sweet animal ; but, when pressed hard by dogs and 

 men, it can eject such a most pestilent and fetid 

 smell and excrement, than which nothing can be 

 more horrible. 



A gentleman sent me lately a fine specimen of 

 the Laniiis minor cinerascens cum macula in scapulis alba 

 Rail ; which is a bird that, at the time of your pub- 

 lishing your first two volumes of British Zoology, I 

 find you had not seen. You have described it well 

 from Edwards's drawing. 



Selborne, Aug. 30, 1769. 



LETTER XXVII. 

 To THE Honourable Daines Barrington. 



When I did myself the honour to write to you 

 about the end of last June on the subject of natural 

 history, I sent you a list of the summer birds of pas- 

 sage which I have observed in this neighbourhood ; 

 and also a list of the winter birds of passage: I 

 mentioned besides those soft-billed birds that stay 

 with us the winter through in the south of Eng- 

 land, and those that are remarkable for singing in 

 the night. 



According to mv proposal, I shall now proceed 



to such birds (singing birds strictly so called) as 



109 



