ON THE BRITISH BIRDS. 561 
orchards, as with us, and is as common in the hedges of Madeira 
as sparrows are in Europe. That it has a feverish, instinctive fear 
of man, however, I think, is certain, for though the cock which I 
mentioned above is now so tame that it will peck or fly from my 
finger, it has the remarkable habit of mooting whenever it is ap- 
proached, and this must undoubtedly be ascribed to fear; as the 
same circumstance maybe observed in the red-breast [Rh.rubecula) 
when he is frightened away from his crumbs at the cottage door. 
By mistaking a similar circumstance with respect to aphides, the 
A'ounger Huber, as I have shown in " Insect Miscellanies," p. 110 — 
13, has been led into the mistake of ascribing anternal language, 
as he calls it, between these insects and ants. 
James Rennie. 
Lee, Kent, 11 th March, 1832. 
VOL. I. XO. 12. 3 Y 
