SELBORNE, _Aug. 1st_, 1770.
Dear Sir,--The French, I think, in general are strangely prolix in their
natural history. What Linnaeus says with respect to insects holds good
in every other branch: "_Verbositas praesentis saeculi_, _calamitas
artis_."
Pray how do you approve of Scopoli's new work? As I admire his
"Entomologia," I long to see it.
I forgot to mention in my last letter (and had not room to insert in the
former) that the male moose, in rutting time, swims from island to
island, in the lakes and rivers of North America, in pursuit of the
females. My friend, the chaplain, saw one killed in the water as it was
on that errand in the river St. Lawrence: it was a monstrous beast, he
told me; but he did not take the dimensions.
When I was last in town, our friend Mr. Barrington most obligingly
carried me to see many curious sights. As you were then writing to him
about horns, he carried me to see many strange and wonderful specimens.
There is, I remember, at Lord Pembroke's at Wilton, a horn room furnished
with more than thirty different pairs; but I have not seen that house
lately.
Mr. Barrington showed me many astonishing collections of stuffed and
living birds from all quarters of the world. After I had studied over
the latter for a time, I remarked that every species almost that came
from distant regions, such as South America, the coast of Guinea, etc.,
were thick-billed birds of the _loxia_ and _fringilla_ genera; and no
_motacillae_, or _muscicapae_, were to be met with. When I came to
consider, the reason was obvious enough, for the hard-billed birds
subsist on seeds which are easily carried on board, while the soft-billed
birds, which are supported by worms and insects, or, what is a
_succedaneum_ for them, fresh raw meat, can meet with neither in long and
tedious voyages. It is from this defect of food that our collections
(curious as they are) are defective, and we are deprived of some of the
most delicate and lively genera.