We have had a very wet autumn and winter, fo as to raife the
fprings to a pitch beyond any thing fince 1764; which was a remarkable
year for floods and high waters. The land-fprings,
which we call lavants, break out much on the downs of Suffix,
Hampjhire, and Wiltjhire. The country people fay when the lavants
rife corn will always be dear; meaning that when the earth is lo
glutted'with water as to fend forth fprings on the downs and
uplands, that the corn-vales muft be drowned: and fo it has
proved for thefe ten or eleven years paft. For land-fprings have
never obtained more fince the memory of man than during that
period; nor has there been known a greater fcarcity of all forts of
grain, confidering the great improvements of modern hulbandry.
Such a run of wet feafons a century or two ago would, I am per-
fuaded, have occafioned a famine. Therefore pamphlets and
newlpaper letters, that talk of combinations, tend to inflame and
miflead; fince we muft not expedt plenty till Providence fends
us more favourable feafons.
' The wheat of laft year, all round this diftridt, and in the county
of Rutland, and elfewhere, yields remarkably bad: and our
wheat on the ground, by the continual late fudden vicjffitudes from
fierce froft to pouring rains, looks poorly; and thp turnips rot
very fall.
I am, &c.
L E T T E R
L E T T E R XX.
TO THP S.yjlE.
D F A H S IR , Se l b o r n i , Feb'. i6 , 17'74V
T he fandunartin, or bank-martin, is by much the leaft of any
of the Britifh hirun.dine.si and, as far as yve have ever feen, the fmalleft"
known hirundo : though Brijfon aflerts that there is one mud*
fnialler, and that is the hirundo■ efculenta.
But it is much to be regretted that it is fcarce pollible for .any
obferver to be fo full and exadl as he could wilh in rCciting the
circumftances attending the life and converfation of this little bird,
fince it is, fir a naturd, at leaft in this part of the kingdom, difdaim-
ing all domeftie attachments, and haunting wijd heaths and commons
where .there are large lakes : while the other fpecies, especially
the fwallow and houfe-maitin, are remarkably gentle and
domefticated, and never feem to think themfdves fafe but under’
the proteftion of man.
Here are in this parilh, in the fand-pits and banks of the lakes
of W oolm er-forejl, feveral colonies of thefe birds.; and yet; they are
never feen in the village; nor do they at all frequent the cottages
that are fcattered about in that wild diftridh The only inftance I
ever remember where this fpecies haunts, any building is at thg
tpwn of Bfhpp’s Waltham, in this county, where many land-martins
neftle and breed in the fcaffold-holes of the hack-wail of W illia m of
Wyhham’% Cables: but then this wall Hands in a veryfeqyeftered and
retired