RINGMER _near_ LEWES, _Oct. 8th_, 1770.
Dear Sir,--I am glad to hear that Kuckalm is to furnish you with the
birds of Jamaica; a sight of the _hirundines_ of that hot and distant
island would be a great entertainment to me.
The Anni of Scopoli are now in my possession; and I have read the _Annus
Primus_ with satisfaction; for though some parts of this work are
exceptionable, and he may advance some mistaken observations, yet the
ornithology of so distant a country as Carniola is very curious. Men
that undertake only one district are much more likely to advance natural
knowledge than those that grasp at more than they can possibly be
acquainted with: every kingdom, every province, should have its own
monographer.
The reason perhaps why he mentions nothing of Ray's Ornithology may be
the extreme poverty and distance of his country into which the works of
our great naturalist may have never yet found their way. You have
doubts, I know, whether this Ornithology is genuine, and really the work
of Scopoli; as to myself I think I discover strong tokens of
authenticity; the style corresponds with that of his Entomology; and his
characters of his Ordines and Genera are many of them new, expressive,
and masterly. He has ventured to alter some of the Linnaean genera with
sufficient show of reason.
It might perhaps be mere accident that you saw so many swifts and no
swallows at Staines; because, in my long observation of those birds, I
never could discover the least degree of rivalry or hostility between the
species.
Ray remarks that birds of the _gallinoe_ order, as cocks and hens,
partridges, and pheasants, etc., are _pulveratrices_, such as dust
themselves, using that method of cleansing their feathers, and ridding
themselves of their vermin. As far as I can observe, many birds that
dust themselves never wash; and I once thought that those birds that wash
themselves would never dust; but here I find myself mistaken: for common
house-sparrows are great pulveratrices, being frequently seen grovelling
and wallowing in dusty roads; and yet they are great washers. Does not
the skylark dust?
_Query_.--Might not Mahomet and his followers take one method of
purification from these pulveratrices? because I find from travellers of
credit, that if a strict Mussulman is journeying in a sandy desert where
no water is to be found, at stated hours he strips off his clothes, and
most scrupulously rubs his body over with sand or dust.
A countryman told me he had found a young fern-owl in the nest of a small
bird on the ground; and that it was fed by the little bird. I went to
see this extraordinary phenomenon, and found that it was a young cuckoo
hatched in the nest of a titlark; it was become vastly too big for its
nest, appearing
". . . . . in tenui re
Majores pennas nido extendisse . . "
and was very fierce and pugnacious, pursuing my finger as I teased it,
for many feet from the nest, and sparring and buffeting with its wings
like a game-cock. The dupe of a dam appeared at a distance, hovering
about with meat in its mouth, and expressing the greatest solicitude.
In July I saw several cuckoos skimming over a large pond; and found,
after some observation, that they were feeding on the _Libellulae_ or
dragon-flies; some of which they caught as they settled on the weeds, and
some as they were on the wing. Notwithstanding what Linnaeus says, I
cannot be induced to believe that they are birds of prey.
This district affords some birds that are hardly ever heard of at
Selborne. In the first place considerable flocks of cross-beaks (_Loxiae
curvirostrae_) have appeared this summer in the pine-groves belonging to
this house; the water-ouzel is said to haunt the mouth of the Lewes
river, near Newhaven; and the Cornish chough builds, I know, all along
the chalky cliffs of the Sussex shore.
I was greatly pleased to see little parties of ring-ouzels (my newly
discovered migrators) scattered, at intervals, all along the Sussex
downs, from Chichester to Lewes. Let them come from whence they will, it
looks very suspicious that they are cantoned along the coast in order to
pass the channel when severe weather advances. They visit us again in
April, as it should seem, in their return; and are not to be found in the
dead of winter. It is remarkable that they are very tame, and seem to
have no manner of apprehensions of danger from a person with a gun.
There are bustards on the wide downs near Brighthelmstone. No doubt you
are acquainted with the Sussex downs; the prospects and rides round Lewes
are most lovely!
As I rode along near the coast I kept a very sharp look-out in the lanes
and woods, hoping I might, at this time of the year, have discovered some
of the summer short-winged birds of passage crowding towards the coast in
order for their departure: but it was very extraordinary that I never saw
a red-start, white-throat, black-cap, uncrested wren, fly-catcher, etc.
And I remember to have made the same remark in former years, as I usually
come to this place annually about this time. The birds most common along
the coast, at present, are the stone-chatters, whinchats, buntings,
linnets, some few wheatears, titlarks, etc. Swallows and house-martins
abound yet, induced to prolong their stay by this soft, still, dry
season.
A land tortoise, which has been kept for thirty years in a little walled
court belonging to the house where I now am visiting, retires under
ground about the middle of November, and comes forth again about the
middle of April. When it first appears in the spring it discovers very
little inclination towards food; but in the height of summer grows
voracious; and then as the summer declines its appetite declines; so that
for the last six weeks in autumn it hardly eats at all. Milky plants,
such as lettuces, dandelions, sowthistles, are its favourite dish. In a
neighbouring village one was kept till by tradition it was supposed to be
a hundred years old. An instance of vast longevity in such a poor
reptile!