OF SELBORNE 163 



by birds of prey, as may be seen by their feathers left in 

 lanes and under hedges. 



The missel-thrush is, while breeding, fierce and pugna- 

 cious, driving such birds as approach its nest, with great 

 fury, to a distance. The Welch call it fen y llwyn, the head 

 or master of the coppice. He suffers no magpie, jay, or 

 blackbird, to enter the garden where he haunts ; and is, for 

 the time, a good guard to the new-sown legumens. In 

 general he is very successful in the defence of his family : 

 but once I observed in my garden, that several magpies 

 came determined to storm the nest of a missel-thrush : 

 the dams defended their mansion with great vigour, and 

 fought resolutely pro aris ^ focis ; but numbers at last 

 prevailed, they tore the nest to pieces, and swallowed the 

 young alive. 



In the season of nidification the wildest birds are com- 

 paratively tame. Thus the ring-dove breeds in my fields, 

 though they are continually frequented ; and the missel- 

 thrush, though most shy and wild in the autumn and 

 winter, builds in my garden close to a walk where people 

 are passing all day long. 



WaU-fruit abounds with me this year : but my grapes, 

 that used to be forward and good, are at present backward 

 beyond all precedent : and this is not the worst of the 

 story ; for the same ungenial weather, the same black cold 

 solstice, has injured the more necessary fruits of the earth, 

 and discoloured and blighted our wheat. The crop of 

 hops promises to be very large. 



Frequent returns of deafness incommode me sadly, and 

 half disqualify me for a naturalist ; for, when those fits are 

 upon me, I lose all the pleasing notices and little intima- 

 tions arising from rural sounds : and May is to me as 

 silent and mute with respect to the notes of birds, etc. as 

 August. My eyesight is, thank God, quick and good; 

 but with respect to the other sense, I am, at times, 

 disabled : 



" And Wisdom at one entrance quite shut out." 



