232 THE NATURAL HISTORY 



round in circles ; and the bank-martin moves with 

 frequent vacillations like a butterfly. Most of the small 

 birds fly by jerks, rising and falling as they advance. 

 Most small birds hop ; but wagtails and larks walk, 

 moving their legs alternately. Skylarks rise and fall per- 

 pendicularly as thej'^ sing : woodlarks hang poised in tlie 

 air ; and titlarks rise and fall in large curves, singing 

 in their descent. The white-throat uses odd jerks and 

 gesticulations over the tops of hedges and bushes. All 

 the duck-kind waddle ; divers and auks walk as if fettered, 

 and stand erect on their tails : these are the compedes of 

 Linnaeus. Geese and cranes, and most wild-fowls, move 

 in figured flights, often changing their position. The 

 secondary remiges of iringse, wild-ducks, and some others, 

 are very long, and give their wings, when in motion, an 

 hooked appearance. Dab-chicks, moor-hens, and coots, 

 fly erect, with their legs hanging down, and hardly make 

 any dispatch ; the reason is plain, their wings are placed 

 too forward out of the true centre of gravity ; as the legs 

 of auks and divers are situated too backward. 



LETTER XLHI 



Selborne, Sept. 9, 1778. 

 Deap Sir, 



From the motion of birds, the transition is natural 

 enough to their notes and language, of which I shall say 

 something. Not that I would pretend to understand 

 their language like the vizier who, by the recital of a 

 conversation which passed between two owls, reclaimed a 

 sultan,* before delighting in conquest and devastation ; 



• Sec Spectator, Vol. VII., No. 512. 



