NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE. 79 



is usually the latest winter-bird of passage. Before our beechen woods 

 were so much destroyed we had myriads of them, reaching in strings 

 for a mile together as they went out in a morning to feed. They leave 

 us early in spring : where do they breed 1* 



The people of Hampshire and Sussex call the missel-bird f the 

 storm-cock, because it sings early in the spring in blowing showery 

 weather ; its song often commences with the year : with us it builds 

 much in orchards. 



A gentleman assures me he has taken the nests of ring-ousels J on 

 Dartmoor : they build in banks on the sides of streams. 



Titlarks not only sing sweetly as they sit on trees, but also as they 

 play and toy about on the wing; and particularly while they are 

 descending, and sometimes they stand on the ground. || 



Adanson's H testimony seems to me to be a very poor fevidence that 

 European swallows migrate during our winter to Senegal : he does not 

 talk at all like an ornithologist ; and probably saw only the swallows 

 of that country, which I know build within Governor O'Hara's hall 

 against the roof. Had he known European swallows, would he not 

 have mentioned the species ] ** 



The house-swallow washes by dropping into the water as it flies : this 

 species appears commonly about a week before the house-martin, and 

 about ten or twelve days before the swift. 



In 1772 there were young house-martins ft in their nest till October 

 the twenty-third. 



The swift t J appears about ten or twelve days later than the house- 

 swallow : viz., about the twenty-fourth or twenty-sixth of April. 



Whin-chats and stone-chatters stay with us the whole year. 



Some wheat-ears continue with us the winter through. || || 



Wag-tails, all sorts, remain with us all the winter. ^jf[ 



Bullfinches,*** when fed on hempseed, often become wholly black. 



We have vast" flocks of female chaffinches ttt all the winter, with 

 hardly any males among them. 



When you say that in breeding-time the cock-snipes make a bleating 

 noise, and I a drumming (perhaps I should have rather said an hum- 

 ming), I suspect we mean the same thing. However, while they are 



* Columba anas, is a more locally distributed species than the other British 

 pigeons. In open countries this species makes its nest in holes of the ground, 

 selecting a rabbit's burrow for the purpose ; it also selects old hollow and pollard 

 trees. 



t p. 224. + P- 229. vol. ii. p. 237. 



|| The anthus arboreus, or tree-pipit is meant here. The common titlark, 

 A . pratensis, does not perch or sing from trees. Pennant confounds these two 

 also, as well as their habits. <$ p. 242. 



** We have received H. rustica from Western Africa, Sierra Leone, &c., but it 

 is not likely they form any of the parties which migrate to Europe. 



ft p. 244. JJ pp. 270, 271. 



We almost suspect that it is the similarity of the females of these two birds 

 that has caused this assertion, a straggling whinchat may remain, but will form 

 the exception. Mr. Yarrell is aware of only two authentic instances. Of the 

 wheat-ear we are still more in doubt. See letter to Barrington, No. XVII. These 

 remarks are again repeated, Letter XLI., but there we again suspect the stone- 

 chat mistaken for whin-chat. 



HII See Letter XIII. , and note. 

 ITf P- 300. *** p. 306. ttt P- 358. 



