G2 THE NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE. 
ivy-berries, which ripen only at that season, in March and 
April. 
I must not omit to tell you (as you have been so lately on 
the study of reptiles) that my people, every now and then of 
late, draw up with a bucket of water from my well, which is 
sixty-three feet deep, a large black warty lizard’ with a fin-taii 
and yellow belly. How they first came down at that depth, 
and how they were ever to have got out thence without help, 
is more than I am able to say. 
My thanks are due to you for your trouble and care in the 
examination of a buck’s head. As far as your discoveries 
reach at present, they seem much to corroborate my suspicions ; 
and I hope Mr. may find reason to give his decision in 
my favor; and then, I think, we may advance this extraordi- 
nary provision of nature as a new instance of the wisdom of | 
God in the creation. 
As yet I have not quite done with my history of the stone- 
curlew; for I shall desire a gentleman in Sussex (near whose 
house these birds congregate in vast flocks in the autumn) to 
observe nicely when they leave him (if they do leave him), and 
when they return again in the spring: I was with this gentle- 
man lately, and saw several single birds. 
LETTER XXI. 
SELBORNE, WVov. 28th, 1768. 
With regard to the stone-curlew, I intend to write very soon 
to my friend near Chichester, in whose neighborhood these 
birds seem most to abound : and shall urge him to take par- 
ticular notice when they begin to congregate, and afterwards 
to watch them most narrowly whether they do not withdraw 
themselves during the dead of the winter. When I have 
, 1 Salamander. 
