9* 
NATURAL HISTORY 
LETTER XXXV. 
TO THE SAME. 
DEAR SIR, Selborne, 1771. 
Happ ENiNG to make a vifit to my neighbour's peacocks, I 
could not help obferving that the trains of thofe magnificent birds 
appear by no means to be their tails ; thofe long feathers growing 
not from their uropygium, but all up their backs. A range of 
fhort brown ftifF feathers, about fix inches long, fixed in the 
uropygium, is the real tail, and ferves as the fulcrum to prop the 
train, which is long and top-heavy, when fet an end. When the 
train is up, nothing appears of the bird before but it's head and 
neck ; but this would not be the cafe were thofe long feathers 
fixed only in the rump, as may be feen by the turkey-cock when 
in a ftrutting attitude. By a ftrong mufcular vibration thefe birds 
can make the fhafts of their long feathers clatter like the fwords 
of a fword-dancer ; they then trample very quick with their feet, 
and run backwards towards the females. 
I fhould tell you that I have got an uncommon calculus 
efgogropila, taken out of the ftomach of a fat ox ; it is perfedly 
round, and about the fize of a large Seville orange ; fuch are, I 
think, ufually fiat. 
LETTER 
