The Natural History of Selborne, Vol. 2 | Page 9

almost too quick for the eye to follow.
After this circumstantial detail of the life and discerning [Greek text] of
the swallow, I shall add, for your farther amusement, an anecdote or
two not much in favour of her sagacity:--
A certain swallow built for two years together on the handles of a pair
of garden-shears, that were stuck up against the boards in an out-house,
and therefore must have her nest spoiled whenever that implement was
wanted: and, what is stranger still, another bird of the same species
built its nest on the wings and body of an owl, that happened by
accident to hang dead and dry from the rafter of a barn. This owl, with
the nest on its wings, and with eggs in the nest, was brought as a
curiosity worthy the most elegant private museum in Great Britain. The
owner, struck with the oddity of the sight, furnished the bringer with a
large shell, or conch, desiring him to fix it just where the owl hung: the
person did as he was ordered, and the following year a pair, probably
the same pair, built their nest in the conch, and laid their eggs.
The owl and the conch make a strange grotesque appearance, and are

not the least curious specimens in that wonderful collection of art and
nature.
Thus is instinct in animals, taken the least out of its way, an
undistinguishing, limited faculty; and blind to every circumstance that
does not immediately respect self-preservation, or lead at once to the
propagation or support of their species.
I am, with all respect, etc., etc.

LETTER XIX.
SELBORNE, Feb. 14th, 1774.
Dear Sir,--I received your favour of the 8th, and am pleased to find that
you read my little history of the swallow with your usual candour; nor
was I the less pleased to find that you made objections where you saw
reason.
As to the quotations, it is difficult to say precisely which species of
hirundo Virgil might intend in the lines in question, since the ancients
did not attend to specific differences like modern naturalists; yet
somewhat may be gathered, enough to incline me to suppose that in the
two passages quoted the poet had his eye on the swallow.
In the first place the epithet garrula suits the swallow well, who is a
great songster, and not the martin, which is rather a mute bird; and
when it sings is so inward as scarce to be heard. Besides, if tignum in
that place signifies a rafter rather than a beam, as it seems to me to do,
then I think it must be the swallow that is alluded to, and not the martin,
since the former does frequently build within the roof against the rafters,
while the latter always, as far as I have been able to observe, builds
without the roof against eaves and cornices.
As to the simile, too much stress must not be laid on it, yet the epithet
nigra speaks plainly in favour of the swallow, whose back and wings
are very black, while the rump of the martin is milk-white, its back and

wings blue, and all its under part white as snow. Nor can the clumsy
motions (comparatively clumsy) of the martin well represent the
sudden and artful evolutions and quick turns which Juturna gave to her
brother's chariot, so as to elude the eager pursuit of the enraged AEneas.
The verb sonat also seems to imply a bird that is somewhat loquacious.
We have had a very wet autumn and winter, so as to raise the springs to
a pitch beyond anything since 1764, which was a remarkable year for
floods and high waters. The land-springs which we call lavants, break
out much on the downs of Sussex, Hampshire and Wiltshire. The
country people say when the lavants rise corn will always be dear;
meaning that when the earth is so glutted with water as to send forth
springs on the downs and uplands, that the corn-vales must be drowned;
and so it has proved for these ten or eleven years past. For land-springs
have never obtained more since the memory of man than during that
period; nor has there been known a greater scarcity of all sorts of grain,
considering the great improvements of modern husbandry. Such a run
of wet seasons a century or two ago would, I am persuaded, have
occasioned a famine. Therefore pamphlets and newspaper letters, that
talk of combinations, tend to inflame and mislead; since we must not
expect plenty till Providence sends us more favourable seasons.
The wheat of last year, all round this district, and in the county of
Rutland, and elsewhere, yields remarkably bad, and our wheat on the
ground, by the continual late sudden vicissitudes from fierce