OF SEL BORNE. 113 



not understand perfectly ; but refer it to the observation of 

 the curious anatomist. 1 These creatures sent forth a very 

 rancid and offensive smeli. 



LETTER XXXVII. 



TO THOMAS PENNANT, ESQUIRE 



SELBORNE, 1771. 



the 12th of July I had a fair opportunity of 

 contemplating the motions of the Caprimulgus, 

 or fern-owl, as it was playing round a large 

 oak that swarmed with Scarabcei solstitiales , 2 

 or fern-chafers. The powers of its wing 

 were wonderful, exceeding, if possible, the various evolu- 

 tions and quick turns of the swallow genus. But the cir- 

 cumstance that pleased me most was, that I saw it dis- 

 tinctly, more than once, put out its short leg while on the 

 wing, and, by a bend of the head, deliver somewhat into its 

 mouth. If it takes any part of its prey with its foot, as I 

 have now the greatest reason to suppose it does these chafers, 

 I no longer wonder at the use of its middle toe > which is 

 curiously furnished with a serrated claw. 



Swallows and martins, the bulk of them I mean, have 



1 This is termed the tragus ; it is found in all our British bats except 

 the greater and lesser horse-shoe bats. In man it exists only as a small 

 lobe projecting in front over the auditory opening. 



When White first wrote to Pennant on the subject of bats, he knew 

 but two indigenous kinds ; the long-eared, and that which he regarded 

 as the short- eared : these, in fact, being all that were even known to 

 Linnaeus as European. White subsequently became acquainted with 

 another ; the great bat of the text. Pennant knew and described a 

 fourth, the horse-shoe bat. Many years subsequently elapsed without 

 the addition of another. The four indigenous species known in 1771 

 have now been increased to at least fourteen distinct species, so great 

 have been the advances that have of late years been made in England in 

 the search after animals and in the discrimination between them. ED. 



2 Amphimalla solstitialis, LATR. 



I 



