The natural history of Selborne . is one fifthheavier than the chirper. The chirper (being thefirst summer bird of passage that is heard, the wry-neck| sometimes excepted) begins his two notes in * The smallest uncrested willow-wren, or chiffchafF, is thenext early summer bird which we have remarked: it utters twosharp, piercing notes, so loud in hollow woods as to occasion anecho, and is usually first heard about the 20th of March. t These birds appear on the grassplots and walks: they walka little as well as hop, and thrust their bills into the turf in quest,I conclude, of ants, which are th
The natural history of Selborne . is one fifthheavier than the chirper. The chirper (being thefirst summer bird of passage that is heard, the wry-neck| sometimes excepted) begins his two notes in * The smallest uncrested willow-wren, or chiffchafF, is thenext early summer bird which we have remarked: it utters twosharp, piercing notes, so loud in hollow woods as to occasion anecho, and is usually first heard about the 20th of March. t These birds appear on the grassplots and walks: they walka little as well as hop, and thrust their bills into the turf in quest,I conclude, of ants, which are their food. While they hold theirbills in the grass, they draw out their prey with their tongues,which are so long as to be coiled round their heads.—White,Observations on Birds. OF SELBORNE. 67 the middle of March, and continues them throughthe spring and summer till the end of August, asappears by my journals. The legs of the larger ofthese two are flesh-coloured; of the less, Grasshopper-lark began his sibilous note. in my fields last Saturday. Nothing can be moreamusing than the whisper of this little bird, whichseems to be close by, though at a hundred yardsdistance; and, when close at your ear, is scarceany louder than when a great way off. Had I notbeen a little acquainted with insects, and known thatthe grasshopper kind is not yet hatched, I shouldhave hardly believed but that it had been a locustawhispering in the bushes. The country peoplelaugh when you tell them that it is the note of abird. It is the most artful creature, skulking in thethickest part of a bush, and will sing at a yards dis-tance provided it be concealed. 1 was obliged toget a person to go on the other side of the hedgewhere it haunted, and then it would run creepinglike a mouse before us for a hundred yards together, 68 NATURAL HISTORY through the bottom of the thorns, yet it would notcome into fair sight; but in a morning early, andwhen undisturbed, it sings on the top of a twig,gaping, a
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