THE NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE. 217 
When one reflects on the state of this strange being, it is 
a matter of wonder to find that Providence should bestow such 
a profusion of days, such a seeming waste of longevity, on a 
reptile that appears to relish it so little as to squander more 
than two-thirds of its existence in a joyless stupor, and be 
lost to all sensation for months together in the profoundest of 
slumbers. 
While I was writing this letter, a moist and warm afternoon, 
with the thermometer at 50°, brought forth troops of shell- 
snails; and, at the same juncture, the tortoise heaved up the 
mould and put out its head; and the next morning came forth, 
as it were, raised from the dead; and walked about till four in 
the afternoon. This was a curious coincidence ! a very amus- 
ing occurrence! to see such a similarity of feelings between 
the two house-bearers—for so the Greeks called both the 
shell-snail and the tortoise. 
Summer birds are, this cold and backward spring, unusually 
late: I have seen but one swallow yet. This conformity with 
the weather convinces me more and more that they sleep in 
the winter. 
LETTER XLVI. 
SELBORNE, Sept. 3rd, 1781. 
I have now read your Miscellanies through with much care 
and satisfaction ; and am to return you my best thanks for the 
honorable mention made in them of me as a naturalist, which 
I wish I may deserve. 
In some former letters I expressed my suspicions that many 
of the house-martins do not depart in the winter far from this 
village. I therefore determined to make some search about 
the southeast end of the hill, where I imagined they might 
slumber out the uncomfortable months of winter. But sup- 
