116 NATURAL HISTORY 
are so little acquainted with tlie human form that they settle 
on men^s shoulders, and have no more dread of a sailor than 
they would have of a goat that was grazing. A young man 
at Lewes, in Sussex, assured me that about seven years ago 
ring-ousels abounded so about that town in the autumn, 
that he killed sixteen himself in one afternoon : he added 
further, that some had appeared since in every autumn ; but 
he could not find that any had been observed before the 
season in which he shot so many. I myself have found 
these birds in little parties in the autumn cantoned all along 
the Sussex downs, wherever there were shrubs and bushes, 
from Chichester to Lewes; particularly in the autumn of 
1770. 
LETTER XXXIX. 
TO THOMAS PENNANT, ESQUIRE. 
Selborne, Xov. 9, 1773. 
S you desire me to send you such observations 
as may occur, I take the liberty of making 
the following remarks, that you may, accord- 
ing as you think me right or wrong, admit or 
reject what I here advance, in your intended 
new edition of the British Zoology .''"'^ 
The osprey was shot about a year ago at Frinsham-pond, 
a great lake, at about six miles from hence, while it was 
sitting on the handle of a plough and devouring a fish. It 
used to precipitate itself into the water, and so take its 
prey by surprise. 
A great ash-coloured butcher-bird was shot last winter in 
Tisted Park, and a red-backed butcher-bird at Selborne : 
they are rarce aves in this county.^ 
1 This was the third edition, which subsequently appeared in 1776, 
and contained many of the notes forwarded by Gilbert White in this 
and the succeeding letter. — Ed. 
2 Another butcher bird, or shrike, of which mention has been made 
