eye-witness: for a gardener at an 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 oeconomy:
… ingentem lato dedit ore fenestram:
Apparet domus intus, et atria longa patescunt:
Apparent … penetralia.
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 this 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.
When mole-crickets fly they move ‘cursu undoso,’ rising and falling in
curves, like the other species mentioned before. In 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 XLIX
To The Honourable 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.
In 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, 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 caricature; 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’echasse. 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 an half, and the legs
four inches and an 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 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 L
To The Honourable 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 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 troupe of shell-snails; 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 the two φερέοικοι! for so the Greeks call both the
shell-snail and the tortoise.
Summer birds are, this cold and backward spring, unusually late: I have
seen but one swallow yet. This conformity with the weather convinces me
more and more that they sleep in the winter.
Letter LI
To The Honourable Daines Barrington
Selborne, Sept. 3, 1781.
I have now read your miscellanies through with much care and
satisfaction: and am to return you my best thanks for the honourable
mention made in them of me as a naturalist, which I wish I may deserve.
In some former letters I expressed my suspicions that many of the
house-martins do not depart in the winter far from this village. I
therefore determined to make some search about the south-east end of
the hill, where I imagined they might slumber out the uncomfortable
months of winter. But supposing that the examination would be made to
the best advantage in the spring, and observing that no martins had
appeared by the 11th of April last, on that day I employed some men to
explore the shrubs and cavities of the suspected spot. The persons took
pains, but without any success: however, a remarkable incident occurred
in the midst of our pursuit-while the labourers were at work a
house-martin, the first that had been seen this year, came down the
village in the sight of several people, and went at once into a nest,
where it stayed a short time, and then flew over the houses; for some
days after no martins were observed, not till the 16th of April, and
then only a pair. Martins in general were remarkably late this year.
Letter LII
To The Honourable Daines Barrington
Selborne, Sept. 9, 1781.
I have just met with a circumstance respecting swifts, which furnishes
an exception to the whole tenor of my observations ever since I have
bestowed any attention on that species of hirundines. Our swifts, in
general, withdrew this year about the first day of August, all save one
pair, which in two or three days was reduced to a single bird. The
perseverance of this individual made me suspect that the strongest of
motives, that of an attachment to her young, could alone occasion so
late a stay. I watched therefore till the twenty-fourth of August, and
then discovered that, under the eaves of the church, she attended upon
two young, which were fledged, and now put out their white chins from a
crevice. These remained till the twenty-seventh, looking more alert
every day, and seeming to long to be on the wing. After this day they
were missing at once; nor could I ever observe them with their dam
coursing round the church in the act of learning to fly, as the first
broods evidently do. On the thirty-first I caused the eaves to be
searched, but we found in the nest only two callow, dead, stinking
swifts, on which a second nest had been formed. This double nest was
full of the black shining cases of the hippoboscae hirundinis.
The following remarks on this unusual incident are obvious. The first
is, that though it may be disagreeable to swifts to remain beyond the
beginning of August, yet that they can subsist longer is undeniable.
The second is, that this uncommon event, as it was owing to the loss of
the first brood, so it corroborates my former remark, that swifts breed
regularly but once; since, was the contrary the case, the occurrence
above could neither be new nor rare.
P.S. One swift was seen at Lyndon, in the county of Rutland, in 1782,
so late as the third of September.
Letter LIII
To The Honourable Daines Barrington
As I have sometimes known you make inquiries about several kinds of
insects, I shall here send you an account of one sort which I little
expected to have found in this kingdom. I had often observed that one
particular part of a vine growing on the walls of my house was covered
in the autumn with a black dust-like appearance, on which the flies fed
eagerly; and that the shoots and leaves thus affected did not thrive;
nor did the fruit ripen. To this substance I applied my glasses; but
could not discover that it had anything to do with animal life, as I at
first expected: but, upon a closer examination behind the larger
boughs, we were surprised to find that they were coated over with husky
shells, from whose sides proceeded a cotton-like substance, surrounding
a multitude of eggs. This curious and uncommon production put me upon
recollecting what I have heard and read concerning the coccus vitis
viniferae of Linnaeus, which, in the South of Europe, infests many
vines, and is an horrid and loathsome pest. As soon as I had turned to
the accounts given of this insect, I saw at once that it swarmed on my
vine; and did not appear to be at all checked by the preceding winter,
which had been uncommonly severe.
Not being then at all aware that it had anything to do with England, I
was much inclined to think that it came from Gibraltar among the many
boxes and packages of plants and birds which I had formerly received
from thence; and especially as the vine infested grew immediately under
my study-window, where I usually kept my specimens. True it is that I
had received nothing from thence for some years: but as insects, we
know, are conveyed from one country to another in a very unexpected
manner, and have a wonderful power of maintaining their existence till
they fall into a nidus proper for their support and increase, I cannot
but suspect still that these cocci came to me originally from
Andalusia. Yet, all the while, candour obliges me to confess that Mr.
Lightfoot has written me word that he once, and but once, saw these
insects on a vine at Weymouth in Dorsetshire; which, it is here to be
observed, is a seaport town to which the coccus might be conveyed by
shipping.
As many of my readers may possibly never have heard of this strange and
unusual insect, I shall here transcribe a passage from a natural
history of Gibraltar, written by the Reverend John White, late vicar of
Blackburn in Lancashire, but not yet published:
‘In the year 1770 a vine which grew on the east side of my house, and
which had produced the finest crops of grapes for years past, was
suddenly overspread on all the woody branches with large lumps of a
white fibrous substance resembling spiders’ webs, or rather raw cotton.
It was of a very clammy quality, sticking fast to everything that
touched it, and capable of being spun into long threads. At first I
suspected it to be the product of spiders, but could find none. Nothing
was to be seen connected with it but many brown oval husky shells,
which by no means looked like insects, but rather resembled bits of the
dry bark of the vine. The tree had a plentiful crop of grapes set, when
this pest appeared upon it; but the fruit was manifestly injured by
this foul incumbrance. It remained all the summer, still increasing,
and loaded the woody and bearing branches to a vast degree. I often
pulled off great quantities by handfuls; but it was so slimy and
tenacious that it could by no means be cleared. The grapes never filled
to their natural perfection, but turned watery and vapid. Upon perusing
the works afterwards of M. de Reaumur, I found this matter perfectly
described and accounted for. Those husky shells, which I had observed,
were no other than the female coccus, from whose sides this cotton-like
substance exudes, and serves as a covering and security for their
eggs.’
To this account I think proper to add, that, though the female cocci
are stationary, and seldom remove from the place to which they stick,
yet the male is a winged insect; and that the black dust which I saw
was undoubtedly the excrement of the females, which is eaten by ants as
well as flies. Though the utmost severity of our winter did not destroy
these insects, yet the attention of the gardener in a summer or two has
entirely relieved my vine from this filthy annoyance.
As we have remarked above that insects are often conveyed from one
country to another in a very unaccountable manner, I shall here mention
an emigration of small aphides, which was observed in the village of
Selborne no longer ago than August the 1st, 1785.
At about three o’clock in the afternoon of that day, which was very
hot, the people of this village were surprised by a shower of aphides,
or smother-flies, which fell in these parts. Those that were walking in
the street at that juncture found themselves covered with these
insects, which settled also on the hedges and gardens, blackening all
the vegetables where they alighted. My annuals were discoloured with
them, and the stalks of a bed of onions were quite coated over for six
days after. These armies were then, no doubt, in a state of emigration,
and shifting their quarters; and might have come, as far as we know,
from the great hop-plantations of Kent or Sussex, the wind being all
that day in the easterly quarter. They were observed at the same time
in great clouds about Farnham, and all along the vale from Farnham to
Alton.*
* For various methods by which several insects shift their quarters,
see Derham’s Physico-Theology.
Letter LIV
To The Honourable Daines Barrington
Dear Sir,
When I happen to visit a family where gold and silver fishes are kept
in a glass bowl, I am always pleased with the occurrence, because it
offers me an opportunity of observing the actions and propensities of
those beings with whom we can be little acquainted in their natural
state. Not long since I spent a fortnight at the house of a friend
where there was such a vivary, to which I paid no small attention,
taking every occasion to remark what passed within its narrow limits.
It was here that I first observed the manner in which fishes die. As
soon as the creature sickens, the head sinks lower and lower, and it
stands as it were on its head; till, getting weaker, and losing all
poise, the tail turns over, and at last it floats on the surface of the
water with its belly uppermost. The reason why fishes, when dead, swim
in that manner is very obvious; because, when the body is no longer
balanced by the fins of the belly, the broad muscular back
preponderates by its own gravity, and turns the belly uppermost, as
lighter from its being a cavity, and because it contains the
swimming-bladders, which contribute to render it buoyant. Some that
delight in gold and silver fishes have adopted a notion that they need
no aliment. True it is that they will subsist for a long time without
any apparent food but what they can collect from pure water frequently
changed; yet they must draw some support from animalcula, and other
nourishment supplied by the water; because, though they seem to eat
nothing, yet the consequences of eating often drop from them. That they
are best pleased with such jejune diet may easily be confuted, since if
you toss them crumbs, they will seize them with great readiness, not to
say greediness: however, bread should be given sparingly, lest, turning
sour, it corrupt the water. They will also feed on the water-plant
called lemna (duck’s meat), and also on small fry.
When they want to move a little they gently protrude themselves with
their pinnae pectorales; but it is with their strong muscular tails
only that they and all fishes shoot along with such inconceivable
rapidity. It has been said that the eyes of fishes are immoveable: but
these apparently turn them forward or backward in their sockets as
their occasions require. They take little notice of a lighted candle,
though applied close to their heads, but flounce and seem much
frightened by a sudden stroke of the hand against the support whereon
the bowl is hung; especially when they have been motionless, and are
perhaps asleep. As fishes have no eyelids, it is not easy to discern
when they are sleeping or not, because their eyes are always open.
Nothing can be more amusing than a glass bowl containing such fishes:
the double refractions of the glass and water represent them, when
moving, in a shifting and changeable variety of dimensions, shades, and
colours; while the two mediums, assisted by the concavo-convex shape of
the vessel, magnify and distort them vastly; not to mention that the
introduction of another element and its inhabitants into our parlours
engages the fancy in a very agreeable manner.
Gold and silver fishes, though originally natives of China and Japan,
yet are become so well reconciled to our climate as to thrive and
multiply very fast in our ponds and stews. Linnaeus ranks this species
of fish under the genus of cyprinus, or carp, and calls it cyprinus
auratus.
Some people exhibit this sort of fish in a very fanciful way; for they
cause a glass bowl to be blown with a large hollow space within, that
does not communicate with it. In this cavity they put a bird
occasionally; so that you may see a goldfinch or a linnet hopping as it
were in the midst of the water, and the fishes swimming in a circle
round it. The simple exhibition of the fishes is agreeable and
pleasant; but in so complicated a way becomes whimsical and unnatural,
and liable to the objection due to him,
Qui variare cupit rem prodigialiter unam.
I am, etc.
Letter LV
To The Honourable Daines Barrington
October 10, 1781.
Dear Sir,
I think I have observed before that much the most considerable part of
the house-martins withdraw from hence about the first week in October;
but that some, the latter broods I am now convinced, linger on till
towards the middle of that month: and that at times, once perhaps in
two or three years, a flight, for one day only, has shown itself in the
first week of November.
Having taken notice, in October 1780, that the last flight was
numerous, amounting perhaps to one hundred and fifty; and that the
season was soft and still; I was resolved to pay uncommon attention to
these late birds; to find, if possible, where they roosted, and to
determine the precise time of their retreat. The mode of life of these
latter hirundines is very favourable to such a design; for they spend
the whole day in the sheltered district between me and the Hanger,
sailing about in a placid, easy manner, and feasting on those insects
which love to haunt a spot so secure from ruffling winds. As my
principal object was to discover the place of their roosting, I took
care to wait on them before they retired to rest, and was much pleased
to find that, for several evenings together, just at a quarter past
five in the afternoon, they all scudded away in great haste towards the
south-east, and darted down among the low shrubs above the cottages at
the end of the hill. This spot in many respects seems to be well
calculated for their winter residence: for in many parts it is as steep
as the roof of any house, and therefore secure from the annoyances of
water; and it is moreover clothed with beechen shrubs, which, being
stunted and bitten by sheep, make the thickest covert imaginable; and
are so entangled as to be impervious to the smallest spaniel: besides,
it is the nature of underwood beech never to cast its leaf all the
winter; so that, with the leaves on the ground and those on the twigs,
no shelter can be more complete. I watched them on to the thirteenth
and fourteenth of October, and found their evening retreat was exact
and uniform; but after this they made no regular appearance. Now and
then a straggler was seen; and on the twenty-second of October, I
observed two in the morning over the village, and with them my remarks
for the season ended.
From all these circumstances put together, it is more than probable
that this lingering flight, at so late a season of the year, never
departed from the island. Had they indulged me that autumn with a
November visit, as I much desired I presume that, with proper
assistants, I should have settled the matter past all doubt; but though
the third of November was a sweet day, and in appearance exactly suited
to my wishes, yet not a martin was to be seen; and so I was forced,
reluctantly, to give up the pursuit.
I have only to add that were the bushes, which cover some acres, and
are not my own property, to be grubbed and carefully examined, probably
those late broods, and perhaps the whole aggregate body of the
house-martins of this district, might be found there, in different
secret dormitories; and that, so far from withdrawing into warmer
climes, it would appear that they never depart three hundred yards from
the village.
Letter LVI
To The Honourable Daines Barrington