XLll.] 
OF SELBORNE. 
121 
should want to migrate from the south of Euro^De, and be dis- 
satisfied with the winters of Andahisia. 
It does not appear to me that much stress can be laid on the 
difficulty and hazard that birds must run in their migrations, by 
reason of vast oceans, cross winds, &c. ; because, if we reflect, 
a bird, by crossing the water at Dover, and again at Gibraltar, 
may travel from England to the equator without launching out 
and exposiug itself to boundless seas. And I advance this 
obvious remark with the more confidence, because my brother 
has always found that some of his birds, and particularly the 
swallow kind, are very sparing of their pains in crossing the 
Mediterranean ; when arrived at Gibraltar, they do not, 
" — — — Ranged in figure wedge tlieir way, 
— — — and set foith 
Their airy caravan high over seas 
Flying, and over lands with mntnal wing 
Easing their flight ; " ■ Milton — 
but scout and hurry along in little detached parties of six or 
seven in a company ; and, sweeping low, just over the surface 
of the land and water, direct their course to the opposite con- 
tinent at the narrowest passage they can find. They usually 
slope across the bay to the south-west, and so pass over opposite 
to Tangier, which, it seems, is the narrowest space. 
In former letters w^e have considered whether it was probable 
that woodcocks in moonshiny nights cross the German ocean 
from Scandinavia. As a proof that birds of less speed may 
pass that sea, considerable as it is, I shall relate the following 
incident, which, though mentioned to have happened so many 
years ago, was strictly matter of fact : — As some people were 
shooting in the parish of Trotton, in the county of Sussex, they 
killed a duck in that dreadful winter 1708-9, with a silver collar 
about its neck,^ on which were engraven the arms of the King 
of Denmark. This anecdote the rector of Trotton at that time 
has often told to a near relation of mine ; and, to the best of 
my remembrance, the collar was in the possession of the rector. 
^ White adds in a note, " I have read a like anecdote of a swan." 
