104 
THE NATURAL HISTORY 
[LETT. 
or hen, presently procures a mate, and so for several times 
following. 
I have known a dove-house infested by a pair of wliite owls, 
which made great havoc among the young pigeons : one of 
the owls was shot as soon as ]30ssible ; but the survivor readily 
found a mate, and the mischief went on. After some time the 
new pair were both destroyed, and the annoyance ceased. 
Another instance I remember of a sportsman, whose zeal for 
the increase of his game being greater than his humanity, after 
pairing-time he always shot the cock-biid of every coujjle of 
partridges upon his grounds ; sup2:>osing that the rivalry of many 
males interrupted the breed : he used to say, that, though he had 
widowed tlie same hen several times, yet he found she was still 
provided with a fresh paramour, that did not take her away 
from her usual haunt. 
Again : I knew a lover of setting, an old sportsman, who has 
often told me that soon after harvest he has frequently taken 
small coveys of partridges, consisting of cock-birds alone ; these 
he pleasantly used to call old bachelors. 
There is a propensity belonging to common house-cats that is 
very remarkable ; I mean their violent fondness for fish, which 
appears to be their most favourite food : and yet nature in this 
instance seems to have planted in them an appetite that, unas- 
sisted, they know not how to gratify : for of all quadrupeds 
cats are the least disposed towards water ; and will not, when 
they can avoid it, deign to wet a foot, much less to plunge 
into that element. 
Quadrupeds that prey on fish are amphibious : such is the 
otter, which by nature is so well formed for diving, that it 
makes great havoc among the inhabitants of the waters. JSTot 
supposing that we had any of those beasts in our shallow 
brooks, I was much pleased to see a male otter brought to me, 
weighing twenty-one pounds, that had been shot on the bank 
of our stream below the Priory, where the rivulet divides the 
parish of Selborne from Harteley-wood. 
[One of my neighbours shot a ring-dove on an evening as it 
was returning from feed and going to roost. AVhen his wife had 
picked and drawn it, she found its craw stuffed with the most 
