OF SELBORNE 135 



manner of apprehensions of danger from a person with 

 a gun. There are bustards on the wide downs near 

 Brighthelmstone. No doubt you are acquainted with the 

 Sussex Downs : the prospects and rides round Lewea 

 are most lovely 1 



As I rode along near the coast I kept a very sharp 

 look-out in the lanes and woods, hoping I might, at this, 

 time of the year, have discovered some of the summer 

 short-winged birds of passage crowding towards the coast 

 in order for their departure : but it was very extraordinary 

 that I never saw a red-start, white-throat, black-cap, 

 uncrested wren, fly-catcher, etc. And I remember ta 

 have made the same remark in former years, as I usually 

 come to this place annually about this time. The birds, 

 most common along the coast at present are the stone- 

 chatters, whin-chats, buntings, linnets, some few wheat- 

 ears, titlarks, etc. Swallows and house-martins abound 

 yet, induced to prolong their stay by this soft, stilly 

 dry season. 



A land-tortoise, which has been kept for thirty years in 

 a little walled court belonging to the house where I now 

 am visiting, retires under ground about the middle of 

 November, and comes forth again about the middle of 

 April. When it first appears in the spring it discovers, 

 very little inclination towards food ; but in the height 

 of summer grows voracious : and then as the summer 

 declines its appetite declines ; so that for the last six 

 weeks in autumn it hardly eats at all. Milky plants, 

 such as lettuces, dandelions, sowthistles, are its favourite 

 dish. In a neighbouring village one was kept till by 

 tradition it was supposed to be an hundred years old. 

 An instance of vast longevity in such a poor reptile ! 



