motion of its legs is ridiculously slow, little exceeding the hour hand of a clock, and suitable to the composure of an animal said to be a whole month in performing one feat of copulation. Nothing can be more assiduous than this creature night and day in scooping the earth, and forcing its great body into the cavity; but, as the noons of that season proved unusually warm and sunny, it was continually interrupted, and called forth, by the heat in the middle of the day; and, though I continued there till the 13th of November, yet the work remained unfinished. Harsher weather, and frosty mornings, would have quickened its operations. No part of its behaviour ever struck me more than the extreme timidity it always expresses with regard to rain; for though it has a shell that would secure it against the wheel of a loaded cart, yet does it discover as much solicitude about rain as a lady dressed in all her best attire, shuffling away on the first sprinklings, and running its head up in a corner. If attended to, it becomes an excellent weather-glass; for as sure as it walks elate, and as it were on tiptoe, feeding with great earnestness in a morning, so sure will it rain before night. It is totally a diurnal animal, and never pretends to stir after it becomes dark. The tortoise, like other reptiles, has an arbitrary stomach, as well as lungs; and can refrain from eating as well as breathing for a great part of the year. When first awakened it eats nothing; nor again in the autumn, before it retires; through the height of the summer, it feeds voraciously, devouring all the food that comes in its way. I was much taken with its sagacity in discerning those that do it kind offices; for, as soon as the good old lady comes in sight who has waited on it for more than thirty years, it hobbles towards its benefactress with awkward alacrity; but remains inattentive to strangers. Thus not only "the ox knoweth his owner, and the ass his master's crib," but the most abject reptile and torpid of beings distinguishes the hand that feeds it, and is touched with the feelings of gratitude. P.S.-In about three days after I left Sussex, the tortoise retired into the ground under the hepatica.† * Isaiah, i. 3. A singular circumstance occurred at Ludlow with a tortoise, the property of Mr Jones, which was put in a convenient place to spend the winter. It was soon attacked by rats, which ate away its eyes, tongue, and all the under parts of its throat, together with the windp pe. In that mutilated state it is supposed it had continued for about three weeks prior to its being discovered. The most remarkable circumstance LETTER LI. TO THOMAS PENNANT, ESQ. SELBORNE, March 15, 1773. DEAR SIR,- By my journal for last autumn, it appears that tne house-martens bred very late, and staid very late in these parts; for, on the 1st of October, I saw young martens in their nests, nearly fledged; and again, on the 21st of October, we had, at the next house, a nest full of young martens just ready to fly, and the old ones were hawking for insects with great alertness. The next morning, the brood forsook their nest, and were flying round the village. From this day, I never saw one of the swallow kind till November the 3d ; when twenty, or perhaps thirty, house-martens were playing all day long by the side of the Hanging Wood, and over my fields. Did these small weak birds, some of which were nestlings twelve days ago, shift their quarters at this late season of the year, to the other side of the northern tropic? Or rather, is it not more probable, that the next church, ruin, chalk-cliff, steep covert, or perhaps sand-bank, lake, or pool, (as a more northern naturalist would say,) may become their hybernaculum, and afford them a ready and obvious retreat? * attending this is, that the animal did not exhibit the least signs of decomposition, nor was animation perceptible. It is, however, quite evident it was alive, otherwise putridity would have ensued. The extreme slow motion of the limbs of tortoises, mentioned by White, is depicted in Homer's Hymn to Hermes, which has been thus translated: Feeding far off from man, the flowery herb The young of the swifts, before leaving their nests, are quite prepared for an aerial excursion of almost any extent. At one time, we were detached, at Holy Island, coast of Northumberland, in command of the castle. A pair of martens built in a hole over the window of our apartment. We were generally disturbed at the early dawn by these birds feeding their young. We had the curiosity to take all the young, four in number, out of the nest for examination. We found them in full feather, although they had never yet attempted to leave their nest. After having satisfied our curiosity, we were preparing to replace them in their nest, when the one we had just taken in our hand for that purpose took to its wings, and was immediately followed by the others. These little birds, accompanied by their parents, disported in the sun for upwards of two hours over the deep valley beneath our windows. They returned to the nest in the afternoon, and left it early next morning, never to return. The parents, on the following day, commenced anew the business of incubation. -ED. We now begin to expect our vernal migration of ringousels every week. Persons worthy of credit assure me, that ringousels 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 extended 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 shew 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 Sussex, assured me, that, about seven years ago, ringousels abounded so about that town in the autumn, that he killed sixteen himself in one afternoon : he added farther, 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 Sussex downs, wherever there were shrubs and bushes, from Chichester to Lewes ; particularly in the autumn of 1770. LETTER LII. TO THE HON. DAINES BARRINGTON. SELBORNE, March 26, 1773. DEAR SIR,— The more I reflect on the orogy of animals, the more I am astonished at its effects. Nor is the violence of this affection more wonderful than the shortness of its duration. Thus, every hen is in her turn the virago of the yard, in proportion to the helplessness of her brood; and will fly in the face of a dog or a sow in defence of those chickens, which, in a few weeks, she will drive before her with relentless cruelty.* * The hen will attack any animal whatever in defence of her chickens; and has been known to lose her own life in attempting to save the life, as she thought, of a brood of young ducklings which she had hatched, on their entering the water. A singular instance of strong affection in the feathered tribe is related by Mr Jesse:"A gentleman in my neighbourhood," says he, “had This affection sublimes the passions, quickens the invention, and sharpens the sagacity of the brute creation. Thus a hen, just become a mother, is no longer that placid bird she used to be; but, with feathers standing on end, wings hovering, and clucking note, she runs about like one possessed. Dams will throw themselves in the way of the greatest danger in order to avert it from their progeny. Thus a partridge will tumble along before a sportsman, in order to draw away the dogs from her helpless covey. In the time of nidification, the most feeble birds will assault the most rapacious. All the hirundines of a village are up in arms at the sight of a hawk, whom they will persecute till he leaves that district.* A very directed one of his wagons to be packed with sundry hampers and boxes, intending to send it to Worthing, where he was going himself. For some time his going was delayed, and he therefore directed that the wagon should be placed in a shed in his yard, packed as it was, till it should be convenient for him to send it off. While it was in the shed, a pair of robins built their nest among some straw in the wagon, and had hatched their young just before it was sent away. One of the old birds, instead of being frightened away by the motion of the wagon, only left its nest from time to time for the purpose of flying to the nearest hedge for food for its young; and thus, alternately affording warmth and nourishment to them, it arrived at Worthing. The affection of this bird having been observed by the wagoner, he took care in unloading not to disturb the robin's nest, and my readers will, I am sure, be glad to hear, that the robin and its young ones returned in safety to Walton Heath, being the place from whence they had set out. The distance the wagon went in going and returning could not have been less than one hundred miles.” .ED. * A curious example of this was manifested by a wren in opposition to martens. Mr Simpson mentions, that, during his residence at Welton, North America, he one morning heard a loud noise from a pair of martens that were flying from tree to tree near his dwelling. They made several attempts to get into a box fixed against the house, which they had before occupied as a breeding place; but they always appeared to fly from it again with the utmost dread, at the same time repeating their usual loud cries. Curiosity led the gentleman to watch their motions. After some time, a small wren came froin the box, and perched on a tree near it, when her shrill notes seemed to amaze her antagonists. Having remained a short time, she flew away, when the martens took an opportunity of returning to the box, but their stay was of short duration; for their diminutive adversary returned, and made them retreat with the greatest precipitation. They continued manoeuvering in this way the whole day; but the following morning, on the wren quitting the box, the martens immediately returned, took possession of their mansion, broke up their own nest, went to work afresh with much diligence and ingenuity, and soon barricaded their door. The wren returned, but could not now re-enter. She made some bold efforts to storm the nest, but was unsuccessful. The martens abstained from food for nearly two exact observer has often remarked, that a pair of ravens, nesting in the rock of Gibraltar, would suffer no vulture or eagle to rest near their station, but would drive them from the hill with an amazing fury: even the blue thrush, at the season of breeding, would dart out from the clefts of the rocks to chase away the kestrel, or the sparrow-hawk. If you stand near the nest of a bird that has young, she will not be induced to betray them by an inadvertent fondness, but will wait about at a distance, with meat in her mouth, for an hour together. Should I farther corroborate what I have advanced above, by some anecdotes which I probably may have mentioned before in conversation, yet you will, I trust, pardon the repetition for the sake of the illustration. The fly-catcher of the Zoology (the stoparola of Ray) builds every year in the vines that grow on the walls of my house.* A pair of these little birds had one year inadvertently placed their nest on a naked bough, perhaps in a shady time, not being aware of the inconvenience that followed. But a hot sunny season coming on before the brood was half fledged, the reflection of the wall became insupportable, and must inevitably have destroyed the tender young, had not affection suggested an expedient, and prompted the parent birds to hover over the nest all the hotter hours, while, with wings expanded, and mouths gaping for breath, they screened off the heat from their suffering offspring. A farther instance I once saw of notable sagacity in a willowwren, which had built in a bank in my fields. This bird a friend and myself had observed as she sat in her nest, but were particularly careful not to disturb her, though we saw she eyed us with some degree of jealousy. Some days after, as we passed that way, we were desirous of remarking how this brood went on; but no nest could be found, till I happened to take up a large bundle of long green moss, as it were carelessly thrown over the nest, in order to dodge the eye of any impertinent intruder. A still more remarkable mixture of sagacity and instinct occurred to me one day, as my people were pulling off the lining of a hot-bed, in order to add some fresh dung. From out of the side of this bed leaped an animal with great agility, days, persevering during the whole of that time in defending the entrance; and the wren, after many fruitless attempts to force the works, raised the siege, quitted her intentions, and left the martens in quiet possession of their dwelling.. ED. * The beam bird, muscicapa grisola of Linnæus. -ED. I |