on the migration of birds. 
1 5 
their fat all absorbed, and their bodies emaciated ? We see 
this fact exemplified in the hedge-hog, one of the most re- 
markable of our hibernating animals, which retires to its hut 
at the approach of winter, with vast stores of fat placed in 
every situation where nature could find room for it. This fat 
is its only source of nutrition for the winter, which, by 
the time the sun rouses it to fresh life and activity, is ex- 
hausted, and the animal comes forth thin and emaciated. 
But the case with birds is extremely different. If, on the 
first day of its appearance, a martin, a swift, or a redstart be 
examined, it will be found as plump and fleshy as at any 
season during its stay ; it appears also as strong on the wing, 
and as full of activity at that period as at any other during 
its abode with us. How the cuckoo, that disappears at so 
early and so hot a season as the first week in July, can be- 
come torpid, is beyond the power of conception. 
The apparent incapability of the landrail to perform the 
task of migration, has often been so strongly adduced as a 
presumptive argument in favour of the hibernating system, 
that those who do not admit that of migration, were it to 
remain unnoticed, might urge it as an objection. It must be 
admitted, that a superficial examination of the habits of this 
bird, tends to favour the supposition of its incapacity for so 
great an exploit, as it often rises from the ground like an 
half animated lump, and seems, with difficulty, to take a flight 
of a hundred yards ; but let us remark its powers when seri- 
ously alarmed. Should it be forced upon the wing by any 
extraordinary cause, by the pursuit of a hawk, for example, 
the velocity of its flight, and the rapidity of its evolutions to 
avoid the common enemy of its race, will at once appear. 
