RAY AND WILLUGHBY 105 



England), rain-fowl, highhoe or heghoe, hew-hole, wit- 

 wall, hickwall. The list might be greatly lengthened ; 

 in Wright's English Dialect Dictionary the woodpecker 

 figures under almost every letter of the alphabet. 

 Wierangle (Germ. Werlcengel) is a name for the shrike, 

 fiusher (Jlesherl) for the lesser shrike. The redwing 

 used to be called a mndthrush, and Dr. Charleton, once 

 known as the author of the Onomasticon Zoicum (1668), 

 traced the name to a belief that the redwing came over 

 in the equinoctial gales. Ray's knowledge of languages 

 showed him that this was a mistake ; the Germans, he 

 says, call the redwing Wyntrostel ( Weindrossel), because 

 it is fond of grapes, and we have adopted the German 

 name, changing its form to suit an erroneous interpre- 

 tation.^ 



Among the helpers to whom he returns thanks Eay 

 mentions Sir Thomas Brown, the author of the Religio 

 Medici, who owned a collection of birds, and had written 

 an account of birds found in Norfolk ; Francis Jessop of 

 Sheffield, Philip Skippon of Wrentham in Suffi^lk, and 

 Ralph Johnson of Brignall in Teesdale. 



The fables which are treated so gravely by his pre- 

 decessors receive little consideration. Gryphons, harpies, 

 phoenixes and rocs find no place in this book. Eay is 

 incredulous about the transformation of barnacles into 

 geese, the renewal of their youth by eagles, the incessant 

 flight of birds of paradise, the wool-bearing fowl, the 

 antipathy between the lion and the cock, the six months' 

 sleep of the humming bird, or the milking of goats by 

 the nightjar. The wonderful tales of Nieremberg are 

 put by themselves in an appendix. 



An introductory section treats of the structure, 



^ p. 190. Turner (Sist. Avium) quotes the English name as wyngthruahe, 

 and the German as weingaerdsvogel 



