to-morrow morning. I gave some directions, in a letter, to what particulars the engraver should be attentive.

:

Finding, while I was on a visit, that I was within a reasonable distance of Ambresbury, I sent a servant over to that town, and procured several living specimens of loaches, which he brought, safe and brisk, in a glass decanter. They were taken in the gulleys that were cut for watering the meadows. From these fishes (which measured from two to four inches in length) I took the following description :The loach, in its general aspect, has a pellucid appearance; its back is mottled with irregular collections of small black dots, not reaching much below the linea lateralis, as are the back and tail fins; a black line runs from each eye down to the nose; its belly is of a silvery white; the upper jaw projects beyond the lower, and is surrounded with six feelers, three on each side; its pectoral fins are large, its ventral much smaller; the fin behind its anus small; its dorsal fin large, containing eight spines; its tail, where it joins to the tail fin, remarkably broad, without any taperness, so as to be characteristic of this genus; the tail fin is broad, and square at the end. From the breadth and muscular strength of the tail, it appears to be an active nimble fish.*

In my visit I was not very far from Hungerford, and did not forget to make some inquiries concerning the wonderful method of curing cancers by means of toads. Several intelligent persons, both gentry and clergy, do, I find, give a great deal of credit to what was asserted in the papers; and I myself dined with a clergyman who seemed to be persuaded that what is related is matter of fact; but, when I came to attend to his account, I thought I discerned circumstances which did not a little invalidate the woman's story of the manner in which she came by her skill. She says of herself, that, "labouring under a virulent cancer, she went to some church where there was a vast crowd; on going into a pew, she was accosted by a strange clergyman, who, after expressing compassion for her situation, told her, that if she would make such an application of living toads as is mentioned, she would be well.” ́ ́Now, is it likely that this unknown gentleman should express so much tenderness for this single sufferer, and not feel any for the many thousands that daily languish under this terrible disorder? Would he not have made use of

The species above described is the cobitis barbatula, or bearded loach there is another species found in most of the streams of Britain, c. taniu.-ED.

this invaluable nostrum for his own emolument; or, at least, by some means of publication or other, have found a method of making it public for the good of mankind? In short, this woman, as it appears to me, having set up for a cancer doctress, finds it expedient to amuse the country with this dark and mysterious relation.

The water-eft has not, that I can discern, the least appearance of any gills; for want of which it is continually rising to the surface of the water to take in fresh air. I opened a bigbellied one, indeed, and found it full of spawn. Not that this circumstance at all invalidates the assertion that they are larvæ; for the larva of insects are full of eggs, which they exclude the instant they enter their last state. The water-eft is continually climbing over the brim of the vessel, within which we keep it in water, and wandering away; and people every summer see numbers crawling out of the pools where they are hatched, upon the dry banks. There are varieties of them, differing in colour; and some have fins up their tail and back, and some have not. *

LETTER XIX.

TO THOMAS PENNANT, ESQ.

SELBORNE, August 17, 1768.

DEAR SIR, I have now, past dispute, made out three distinct species of the willow-wrens, motacilla trochili, which constantly and invariably use distinct notes. But, at the same time, I am obliged to confess that I know nothing of your willow-lark.† In my letter of April the 18th, I had told you peremptorily that I knew your willow-lark, but had not seen it then; but, when I came to procure it, it proved, in all respects, a very motacilla trochilus; only that it is a size larger than the two other, and the yellow green of the whole upper part of the body is more vivid, and the belly of a clearer white. I have specimens of the three sorts now lying before me, and can discern that there are three gradations of sizes, and that the least has black legs, and the other two flesh-coloured ones. The yellowest bird is considerably the largest, and has its quill feathers and secondary feathers tipped with white,

* The eft is liable to a change in the size of its fins during the season of love; at which time the membranes of the tail and back increase considerably.-ED.

+ Brit. Zool. edit. 1776, octavo, p. 381.

D

which the others have not. This last haunts only the tops of trees in high beechen woods, and makes a sibilous grasshopperlike noise now and then, at short intervals, shivering a little with its wings when it sings; and is, I make no doubt now, the regulus non cristatus of Ray; which he says, "cantat voce stridula locusta." Yet this great ornithologist never suspected that there were three species. *

LETTER XX.

TO THOMAS PENNANT, ESQ.

SELBORNE, October 8, 1768.

It is, I find, in zoology as it is in botany: all nature is so full, that that district produces the greatest variety which is the most examined. Several birds, which are said to belong to the north only, are, it seems, often in the south. I have discovered this summer three species of birds with us, which writers mention as only to be seen in the northern counties. The first that was brought me, on the 14th of May, was the sandpiper, tringa hypoleucus: it was a cock bird, and haunted the banks of some ponds near the village; and, as it had a companion, doubtless intended to have bred near that water. Besides, the owner has told me since, that, on recollection, he has seen some of the same birds round his ponds in former summers. +

The next bird that I procured, on the 21st of May, was a male red backed butcher-bird, lanius collurio. My neighbour, who shot it, says that it might easily have escaped his notice, had not the outcries and chattering of the white-throats and other small birds drawn his attention to the bush where it was : its craw was filled with the legs and wings of beetles. ‡

*See our note at page 24. -ED.

+ This bird is the totanus hypoleucus of Temminck. It visits Britain in the spring, and chiefly frequents our lakes and rivers; on the borders of which it makes a nest composed of moss and dried leaves. Great numbers breed in Scotland. This bird is found in most parts of Europe, even as far north as Siberia. It migrates in October to the shores of Asia and Africa. - ED.

This is rather a local species, although not uncommon in Gloucester, shire and Somersetshire. It visits us in May, and departs in September The species is very voracious, preying on small birds, and transfixing them to a thorn to feed on. Montagu mentions having found young ones, "which lived in amity for about two months, when violent battles ensued, and two out of the four were killed. The other two were chained

The next rare birds (which were procured for me last week) were some ringousels, turdi torquati.

This week twelvemonths a gentleman from London, being with us, was amusing himself with a gun, and found, he told us, on an old yew hedge, where there were berries, some birds like blackbirds, with rings of white round their necks; a neighbouring farmer also at the same time observed the same; but, as no specimens were procured, little notice was taken. I mentioned this circumstance to you in my letter of November the 4th, 1767; you, however, paia but small regard to what I said, as I had not seen these birds myself: but last week the aforesaid farmer, seeing a large flock, twenty or thirty of these birds, shot two cocks and two hens; and says, on recollection, that he remembers to have observed these birds again last spring, about Ladyday, as it were, on their return to the north. Now, perhaps these ousels are not the ousels of the north of England, but belong to the more northern parts of Europe; and may retire before the excessive rigour of the frosts in those parts; and return to breed in spring, when the cold abates. If this be the case, here is discovered a new bird of winter passage, concerning whose migrations the writers are silent; but if these birds should prove the ousels of the north of England, then here is a migration disclosed within our own kingdom never before remarked. It does not yet appear whether they retire beyond the bounds of our island to the south; but it is most probable that they usually do, or else one cannot suppose that they would have continued so long unnoticed in the southern counties.* The ousel is larger than a blackbird, and feeds on haws; but last autumn (when there were no haws) it fed on yew-berries; in the spring it feeds on ivy-berries, which ripen only at that season, in March and April.

in the manner goldfinches frequently are; they were extremely docile ; would come to the call for the sake of a fly, of which they were extremely fond; when raw meat was given them, would endeavour to fasten it to some part of their cage in order to tear it; would eat mice and small birds cut in pieces, feathers, fur, and bones, disgorging the refuse like the hawk tribe. One was killed by swallowing too large a quantity of mouse fur, which it could not eject.-ED.

It

*The ring-blackbird, as Selby informs us, is a bird of passage. arrives in this country in the spring, and immediately resorts to its breeding quarters in the mountainous districts of England and Scotland, preferring the most barren retreats. It migrates in the end of October to France and Germany, but is said to be found in Africa and Asia under different degrees of latitude.-ED.

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 tail, 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 favour; and then, I think, we may advance this extraordinary 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 oedicnemus, or 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 gentleman lately, and saw several single birds.t

LETTER XXI.

TO THOMAS PENNANT, ESQ.`

SELBORNE, November 28, 1768. DEAR SIR,-With regard to the oedicnemus, or stonecurlew, I intend to write very soon to my friend near Chichester, in whose neighbourhood these birds seem most to abound; and shall urge him to take particular notice when they begin to congregate, and afterward to watch them most narrowly, whether they do not withdraw themselves during the dead of

* We found a very large specimen of this animal in an old wooden conduit at Fountainbridge, Edinburgh, which had been stopped at both ends for upwards of twenty years. So that the animal must have been, at least, that age, as it was not possible that it could obtain access from the time the conduit was stopped.-ED.

+ This is the oedicnemus crepitans of Temminck, the stone-curlew of British authors. It is a migratory species, appearing in the latter end of April, or beginning of May, and leaving Britain early in October. It makes no nest, but lays two eggs on the bare ground; these are of a light brown colour, blotched and streaked with dusky. This bird confines its range to the southern counties, never having been noticed except in Norfolk, Hampshire, Sussex, and Dorsetshire.-ED.