Volume I Part 8 (2/2)
Persons worthy of credit a.s.sure me that ring-ousels were seen at Christmas, 1770, in the forest of Bere, on the southern verge of this county. Hence we may conclude that their migrations are only internal, and not extending to the continent southward, if they do at first come at all from the northern parts of this island only, and not from the north of Europe. Come from whence they will, it is plain, from the fearless disregard that they show for men or guns, that they have been little accustomed to places of much resort. Navigators mention that in the Isle of Ascension, and other such desolate districts, birds are so little acquainted with the human form that they settle on men's shoulders, and have no more dread of a sailor than they would have of a goat that was grazing. A young man at Lewes, in Suss.e.x, a.s.sured me that about seven years ago ring-ousels abounded so about that town in the autumn that he killed sixteen himself in one afternoon; he added further, that some had appeared since in every autumn, but he could not find that any had been observed before the season in which he shot so many. I myself have found these birds in little parties in the autumn cantoned all along the Suss.e.x downs, wherever there were shrubs and bushes, from Chichester to Lewes, particularly in the autumn of 1770.
I am, etc.
LETTER x.x.xIX.
SELBORNE, _Nov. 9th_, 1773.
Dear Sir,--As you desire me to send you such observations as may occur, I take the liberty of making the following remarks, that you may, according as you think me right or wrong, admit or reject what I here advance, in your intended new edition of the ”British Zoology.”
The osprey was shot about a year ago at Frinsham Pond, a great lake, at about six miles from hence, while it was sitting on the handle of a plough and devouring a fish: it used to precipitate itself into the water, and so take its prey by surprise.
A great ash-coloured butcher-bird was shot last winter in Tisted Park, and a red-backed butcher-bird [shrike] at Selborne: they are _rarae aves_ in this county.
Crows go in pairs all the year round.
Cornish choughs abound, and breed on Beachy Head, and on all the cliffs of the Suss.e.x coast.
The common wild pigeon, or stock-dove, is a bird of pa.s.sage in the south of England, seldom appearing till towards the end of November; is usually the latest winter-bird of pa.s.sage. Before our beechen woods were so much destroyed we had myriads of them, reaching in strings for a mile together as they went out in a morning to feed. They leave us early in spring: where do they breed?
The people of Hamps.h.i.+re and Suss.e.x call the missel-bird the storm-c.o.c.k, because it sings early in the spring in blowing, showery weather; its song often commences with the year: with us it builds much in orchards.
A gentleman a.s.sures me he has taken the nests of ring-ousels on Dartmoor: they build in banks on the sides of streams.
t.i.tlarks not only sing sweetly as they sit on trees, but also as they play and toy about on the wing, and particularly while they are descending, and sometimes they stand on the ground.
Adanson's testimony seems to me to be a very poor evidence that European swallows migrate during our winter to Senegal: he does not talk at all like an ornithologist; and probably saw only the swallows of that country, which I know build within Governor O'Hara's hall against the roof. Had he known European swallows, would he not have mentioned the species?
The house-swallow washes by dropping into the water as it flies: this species appears commonly about a week before the house-martin, and about ten or twelve days before the swift.
In 1772 there were young house-martins in their nest till October 23rd.
The swift appears about ten or twelve days later than the house-swallow: viz., about the 24th or 26th April.
Whin-chats and stone-chatters stay with us the whole year.
Some wheat-ears continue with us the winter through.
Wag-tails, all sorts, remain with us all the winter. Bullfinches, when fed on hempseed, often become wholly black.
We have vast flocks of female chaffinches all the winter, with hardly any males among them.
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