48 
NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE. 
himself had no knowledge of this bird, but received his account 
from Mr. Johnson, who apparently confounds it with the reguli 
non cristati, from which it is very distinct. See Ray's Philoso- 
phical Letters, p. 108. 
The fly-catcher (stoparola)* has not yet appeared : it usually 
Gray Fly-catcher. White-fronted Redstart. 
breeds in my vine. The redstart begins to sing : its note is 
short and imperfect, but is continued till about the middle of 
June.f The willow- wrens (the smaller sort) are horrid pests in 
a garden, destroying the pease, cherries, currants, &c. ; and are 
so tame that a gun will not scare them. J 
bramble covert, and is extremely difficult to find. It differs in character from those of the true 
reedlings, more resembling those of the different fauvets {ficeduld)^ but is of a more compact 
structure than the latter, and contains a greater portion of material. The eggs, four or five in 
number, are grayish, with numerous specks of a deeper, sometimes brownish, tint. They vary 
somewhat in plumage, some being rather more spotted than others, but there is no fixed dif- 
ference between the sexes. The female is very hard to procure. I have noticed that the tendons 
of the leg around the tibia are in this species invariably very firm and stiff, and not soft, and 
flexible, and contractile when cut, as in the reedlings, and indeed as in every other insessorial bird 
that I have examined. The intent of this I do not exactly comprehend. — Ed. 
* Muscicapa grisola. — Ed. 
t The redstart's song considerably resembles that of the migrant furze-chat or *' whinchat" of 
authors (saxicola-rubetra ?nig-T'a?oria)> 'consisting ^of short and rather plaintive detached staves, 
most of which commence with a peculiar drawn-out note resembling **t'yare," those of the 
other beginning with a kind of "tit-tit," by an attention to which any novice may distinguish 
them. The redstart usually sings from one of the topmost branches of a tall tree, or perched 
upon some high pinnacle of a building; occasionally, also, during flight. One of these birds, 
says Bechstein, which had built its nest under my roof, imitated very exactly the notes of a chaf- 
finch 1 had in a cage in the window, and my neighbour had another in his garden which repeated 
all the notes of the fauvette. — Ed. 
t Mr. White is altogether wrong in what he here advances. It is quite true that the different 
species of pettychaps (or " willow- wren," as he terms them) are continually seen about the fruit, 
and pa?ticularly upon raspberry-bushes when the hemes are ripe; but, so far from being consi- 
dered as " horrid pests in a garden,^' they should be held rather in the light of preservers, their 
object of attraction not being the fruit, but the flies and other insects that feed upon it ; and the 
same may be said of the gray fly-catcher. I had an opportunity last season of examining a num 
ber of these birds that had been shot under the needless apprehension that they were eating 
raspberries, but in no instance could I discover any trace of fruit in their stomachs. The real 
depredators (after the thrush tribe) are the several species of fauvet, and particularly those de- 
lightful songsters the black-caps and garden-fauvets, to which hardly anything in the shape of 
fruit comes amiss. The robin and the redstart will also pull a few currants, which they swallow 
whole. I have seen them do so, and have found this food in their stomachs, but th» quantity they 
