58
to obferve nicely when they leave him, (if they do leave him)
and when they return again in the fpring : I was with this gentle*
man lately, and law feveral Angle birds.
L E T T E R X X L
TO TH® SA-'IE.
D EA R SIR, -%KBOri?k, tifoy, jJ,
Wt TH regard to the oedicnemus, or ftone-curleW, I intend to*
write very foon to my friend near Chichejler, in whofe neighbourhood
thefe birds feem moft to abound'; and fhali urge him to take-
particular notice when they begin to congregate,, and afterwards
to watch them moft narrowly whether they do not withdraw tliem-
felves during the dead of the winter. When I have obtained information
with refpedt to this circumftance, I lhali have finifhed my
hiftory of the fione-curlew ; which I hope will prove to- your fatiff
fadtion, as it will be, I truft, very near the truth. This gentleman,
as he occupies a large farm of his own, and is abroad' early
and late, will be a very proper fpy upon the motions of thefe birds :
and befides, as I have prevailed on him to buy the Nafuralift’s
Journal (with which he is much delighted), I lhali expeift that
he will be very exaft in his dates. It is very extraordinary, as
you obferve, that a bird fo common with us ihould never
ftraggle to you.
And here will be the propereft place to mention, while I think
of it, an anecdote which the above-mentioned gentleman told me
when
when I was îaît athtsfeoufe*; which wa's -that, in a warren joining
to his outlet, many daws (drrvi .monedulx) build every year in the
rabbit-burrows tinder ground. The way he and his brothers ufed
to take their nefts, while they were boys, was byliftening at the
mouths of the'holes ; and, i f they heard the young -oites -cry, they
ttvifted the neft out with a forked ’flick. Some ■ Water-fbwls"(tfe
the puffins) breed, I know, in that manner-; but I Ihould never
have fufpefttd the daws of building in holes on the-flat ground.
-Another very unlikely fpot is 'made rife of by idaws as a place to
breed in, and that is Stonehenge* Thefe birds dépolit their nefts
in the interftices between the upright arid the impoft ftones of
that amazing work of antiquity : which circumftance alone
fpeaks the prodigious height of the upright ftones, that they
Ihould be tall enough to fecure thofe nefts from the annoyance of
Ihepherd-boys, who are always idling round that place.
One of my neighbours laft Saturday, November the 26th, faw
a martin in a fheltered -bottom.: the fun Ihone warm, and the
bird was hawking brilkly after flies. I am now perfeftly fatisfied
that they do not all leave this ifland in the winter.
Tou judge very right, I think, in fpeaking with referve and
caution concerning the cures done by toads : for, let people ad-
varicêwhat they will on fuch fubjefts, yet there is fuch a propen-
fityin mankind towards : deceiving -and'being deceived, that" one
-cannot fafely rekteany thing from common report, fefpeèially in
print, without-expreffing feme degree of -doubt and fufpicion.
'Your approbation, with regard to my new difhovery-of the
migration o f the ring-oufel, gives meTatisfaótion ; and I find you
concur with me in fufpe&ing that they are’foreign birds Which
vifit us. You will be fure, I hope, -not to omit to1 make - inquiry
whether your, rin-g-oufels'-leave yowrroéks in the -autumn. What
I 2 puzzles