About the beginning of May, they lay their eggs, as I was once an eye-witness; for a gardener, at a house where I was on a visit, happening to be mowing, on the 6th of that month, by the side of a canal, his scythe struck too deep, pared off a large piece of turf, and laid open to view a curious scene of domestic economy : ingentem lato dedit ore fenestram; There were many caverns and winding passages leading to a kind of chamber, neatly smoothed and rounded, and about the size of a moderate snuff-box. Within the secret nursery were deposited near an hundred eggs, of a dirty yellow colour, and enveloped in a tough skin; but too lately excluded to contain any rudiments of young, being full of a viscous substance. The eggs lay but shallow, and within the influence of the sun, just under a little heap of fresh moved mould, like that which is raised by ants. In When mole-crickets fly, they move cursu undoso, rising and falling in curves, like the other species mentioned before. different parts of this kingdom, people call them fen-crickets, churr-worms, and eve-churrs, all very apposite names. Anatomists, who have examined the intestines of these insects, astonish me with their accounts: for they say, that from the structure, position, and number of their stomachs, or maws, there seems to be good reason to suppose that this and the two former species ruminate, or chew the cud like many quadrupeds! LETTER XCI. TO THE HON. DAINES BARRINGTON. SELBORNE, May 7, 1779. It is now more than forty years that I have paid some attention to the ornithology of this district, without being able to exhaust the subject: new occurrences still arise as long as any inquiries are kept alive. În the last week of last month, five of those most rare birds, too uncommon to have obtained an English name, but known to naturalists by the terms of himantopus, or loripes, and charadrius himantopus, * were shot upon the verge of Frinsham Pond, *This is the long-legged plover of Bewick, and other British authors. -ED. a large lake belonging to the Bishop of Winchester, and lying between Wolmer Forest and the town of Farnham, in the county of Surrey. The pond-keeper says there were three brace in the flock; but that, after he had satisfied his curiosity, he suffered the sixth to remain unmolested. One of these specimens I procured, and found the length of the legs to be so extraordinary, that, at first sight, one might have supposed the shanks had been fastened on to impose on the credulity of the beholder: they were legs in caricatura; and had we seen such proportions on a Chinese or Japan screen, we should have made large allowances for the fancy of the draughtsman. These birds are of the plover family, and might, with propriety, be called the stilt-plovers. Brisson, under that idea, gives them the apposite name of l'échasse. My specimen, when drawn, and stuffed with pepper, weighed only four ounces and a quarter, though the naked part of the thigh measured three inches and a half, and the legs four inches and a half: Hence we may safely assert, that these birds exhibit, weight for inches, incomparably the greatest length of legs of any known bird. The flamingo, for instance, is one of the most long-legged birds, and yet it bears no manner of proportion to the himantopus; for a cock flamingo weighs, at an average, about four pounds avoirdupois; and his legs and thighs measure usually about twenty inches. But four pounds are fifteen times and a fraction more than four ounces and one quarter: and if four ounces and a quarter have eight inches of legs, four pounds must have one hundred and twenty inches and a fraction of legs, viz. somewhat more than ten feet,-such a monstrous proportion as the world never saw! If you should try the experiment in still larger birds, the disparity would still increase. It must be matter of great curiosity to see the stilt-plover move; to observe how it can wield such a length of lever with such feeble muscles as the thighs seem to be furnished with. At best, one should expect it to be but a bad walker: but what adds to the wonder is, that it has no back toe. Now, without that steady prop to support its steps, it must be liable, in speculation, to perpetual vacillations, and seldom able to preserve the true centre of gravity. The old name of himantopus is taken from Pliny; and, by an awkward metaphor, implies that the legs are as slender and pliant as if cut out of a thong of leather. Neither Willughby nor Ray, in all their curious researches, either at home or abroad, ever saw this bird. Mr Pennant never met with it in all Great Britain, but observed it often in the cabinets of the curious at Paris. Hasselquist says, that it migrates to Egypt in the autumn; and a most accurate observer of nature has assured me, that he has found it on the banks of the streams in Andalusia. Our writers record it to have been found only twice in Great Britain. From all these relations it plainly appears, that these long-legged plovers are birds of South Europe, and rarely visit our island; and when they do, are wanderers and stragglers, and impelled to make so distant and northern an excursion, from motives or accidents, for which we are not able to account. One thing may fairly be deduced, that these birds come over to us from the Continent, since nobody can suppose that a species not noticed once in an age, and of such a remarkable make, can constantly breed unobserved in this kingdom.* LETTER XCII. TO THE HON. DAINES BARRINGTON. SELBORNE, April 21, 1780. DEAR SIR, - The old Sussex tortoise, that I have mentioned to you so often, is become my property. I dug it out of its winter dormitory in March last, when it was enough awakened to express its resentments by hissing; and, packing it in a box with earth, carried it eighty miles in post chaises. The rattle and hurry of the journey so perfectly roused it, that when I turned it out on a border, it walked twice down to the bottom of my garden: however, in the evening, the weather being cold, it buried itself in the loose mould, and continues still concealed. As it will be under my eye, I shall now have an opportunity of enlarging my observations on its mode of life, and propensities; and perceive already, that, towards the time of coming forth, it opens a breathing-place in the ground near its head, requiring, I conclude, a freer respiration as it becomes more alive. This creature not only goes under the earth from the middle of November to the middle of April, but sleeps great part of the summer; for it goes to bed, in the longest days, at four in the afternoon, and often does not stir in the morning * This bird is a widely diffused species, being common in Egypt, the shores of the Caspian Sea, the southern deserts of Independent Tartary, and Madras, in the East Indies. - ED. till late. Besides, it retires to rest for every shower, and does not move at all in wet days.* When one reflects on the state of this strange being, it is a matter of wonder, to find that Providence should bestow such a profusion of days, such a seeming waste of longevity, on a reptile that appears to relish it so little as to squander more than two-thirds of its existence in a joyless stupor, and be lost to all sensation for months together in the profoundest of slumbers. While I was writing this letter, a moist and warm afternoon, with the thermometer at 50, brought forth troops of shellsnails; and, at the same juncture, the tortoise heaved up the mould and put out its head; and the next morning came forth, as it were raised from the dead, and walked about till four in the afternoon. This was a curious coincidence-a very amusing occurrence-to see such a similarity of feelings between two pegsono,-for so the Greeks call both the shell-snail and the tortoise. + Summer birds are, this cold and backward spring, unusually That of * Dr Bright mentions that land-tortoises are used as food in Hungary. He says, "In the evening I was taken to see another object of curiosity, -the garden kept for the rearing and preservation of land-tortoises. The testudo orbicularis is the species most common about the lake, and the river Szala, which falls into it. Tortoises, likewise, occur in great numbers in various parts of Hungary, more particularly about Füxes Gyarmath, and the marshes of the river Theiss; and being deemed a delicacy for the table, are caught and kept in preserves. Keszthely encloses about an acre of land, intersected by trenches and ponds, in which the animals feed and enjoy themselves. In one corner was a space separated from the rest by boards two feet high, forming a pen for snails, which here, as well as in Germany, are in request as an article of food. The upper edge of the boards were spiked with nails an inch in height, and at intervals of half an inch, over which, I was assured, these animals never attempt to make their way. This snail, the helix pomatia, is in great demand in Vienna, where sacks of them are regularly exposed for sale in the markets, alternating with sacks of beans, lentils, kidney-beans, and truffles." The helix pomatia is now ranked among the British land snails. It is the largest of our land shells; is pretty abundant in some of the southern counties of England; and was introduced by the luxurious Romans, during their residence in Britain. - ED. +Snail shells remain in a torpid state during the winter, in the holes of walls, in the ground, or under large stones. They, however, sometimes make their appearance in winter, if the weather should be very mild, and particularly in moist or rainy days. These animals have a wonderful faculty of living, for a great length of time, without food. They have been known to exist in a drawer, or box, without nutriment of for two or three years. ED. any kind, late: I have seen but one swallow yet. This conformity with the weather convinces me more and more that they sleep in the winter. MORE PARTICULARS RESPECTING THE OLD FAMILY TORTOISE. BECAUSE We call this creature an abject reptile, we are too apt to undervalue his abilities, and depreciate his powers of instinct. Yet he is, as Mr Pope says of his lord, Much too wise to walk into a well; and has so much discernment as not to fall down a haha, but to stop and withdraw from the brink with the readiest precaution. Though he loves warm weather, he avoids the hot sun; because his thick shell, when once heated, would, as the poet says of solid armour, "scald with safety." He therefore spends the more sultry hours under the umbrella of a large cabbage leaf, or amidst the waving forests of an asparagus bed. But as he avoids the heat in summer, so, in the decline of the year, he improves the faint autumnal beams, by getting within the reflection of a fruit wall; and, though he never has read that planes inclining to the horizon receive a greater share of warmth, he inclines his shell, by tilting it against the wall, to collect and admit every feeble ray. Pitiable seems the condition of this poor embarrassed reptile ; to be cased in a suit of ponderous armour, which he cannot lay aside; to be imprisoned, as it were, within his own shell, must preclude, we should suppose, all activity and disposition for enterprise. Yet there is a season of the year (usually the beginning of June) when his exertions are remarkable. He then walks on tiptoe, and is stirring by five in the morning; and, traversing the garden, examines every wicket and interstice in the fences, through which he will escape if possible; and often has eluded the care of the gardener, and wandered to some distant field. The motives that impel him to undertake these rambles seem to be of the amorous kind: his fancy then becomes intent on sexual attachments, which transport him beyond his usual gravity, and induce him to forget for a time his ordinary solemn deportment. * Several years ago a book was written entitled, "Fruit walls improved by inclining them to the horizon; " in which the author has shewn, by calculation, that a much greater number of the rays of the sun will fall on such walls than on those which are perpendicular. |