LETTERS TO THE HON. DAINES BARRINGTON. 
LETTER I, 
SELBORNE, June 30th, 1769. 
HILE I was in town last month I partly engaged that I 
would sometimes do myself the honor to write to you 
on the subject of natural history; and I am the more ready to 
fulfil my promise, because I see you are a gentleman of great 
candor, and one that will make allowances; especially where 
the writer professes to be an outdoor naturalist, one that takes 
his observations from the subject itself, and not from the writ- 
ings of others. 
The following is a list of the summer birds of passage which 
I have discovered in this neighborhood, ranged somewhat in 
the order in which they appear: 
USUALLY APPEARS ABOUT 
1. Wryneck.! The middle of March: harsh note. 
2. Smallest willow-wren. March 23d: chirps till September. 
3. Swallow. April 13th. 
4. Martin. Ditto. 
5. Sand-martin. Ditto. 
6. Black-cap. Ditto: a sweet wild note. 
7. Nightingale. Beginning of April. 
8. Cuckoo. Middle of April. 
9g. Middle willow-wren. Ditto: a sweet plaintive note. 
10. White-throat. Ditto: mean note ;, sings on till September. 
11. Redstart. Ditto: more agreeable song. 
12. Stone-curlew. End of March: loud nocturnal whistle. 
13. Turtle-dove. ; aes 
14. Grasshopperlark. } Middle April: a small sibilous note, till the end 
of July. 
15. Swift. About April 27th. 
1 These birds appear on the grass-plots and walks; they walk a little as well as hop, 
and thrust their bills into the turf, in quest, I conclude, of ants, which are their food. While 
they hold their bills in the grass, they draw out their prey with their tongues, which are so 
long as to be coiled round their heads. — W. 
