136 NATURAL HISTORY 
of each fex, it Ihould feem very improbable that any one diftrift 
fliould produce fuch numbers of thefe little birds ; and much more 
when only one half of the fpecies appears : therefore we may con- 
clude that the fnnglUa Celebes, for fome good purpofes, have a 
peculiar migration of their own in which the fexes part. Nor 
fliould it feem fo wonderful that the intercourfe of fexes in this 
fpecies of birds fliould be interrupted in winter ; fmce in many 
animals, and particularly in bucks and does, the fexes herd 
feparately, except at the feafon when commerce is neceffary for 
the continuance of the breed. For this matter of the chaffinches 
fee Fauna Suecica, p. 85, and Syjlcma 'Naturae, p. 318. I fee every 
winter vaft flights of hen chaffinches, but none of cocks. 
Your method of accounting for the periodical m.otions of the 
Britijl) finging birds, or birds of flight, is a very probable one ; 
fince the matter of food is a great regulator of the adions and pro- 
ceedings of the brute creation : there is but one that can be fet in 
competition with it,anc3that is love. But I cannot quite acquiefce with 
you in one circumltance when you advance that, " when they have 
" thus feafted, they again feparate into fmall parties of five or fix, 
and get the befl; fare they can v/Ithin a certain diHriift, having 
no inducement to go in queft of frefh-turned earth." Now 
if you mean that th.c bufmefs of congregating is quite at an end 
from the conclufion of whcat-fowing to the feafon of barley and 
oats, it is not the cafe with us ; for larks and chaffinches, and 
particularly linnets, flock and congregate as much in the very dead 
of winter as when the hufbandman is bufy with his ploup^hs and 
harrows. 
Sure there can be no doubt but that woodcocks and fieldfares 
leave us in the fpring, in order to crofs the feas, and to retire to 
fonie diftricls more fuitable to the purpofe of breeding. That the 
former 
