Page:White - The Natural History and Antiquities of Selborne.djvu/129



Letter XLIII To Thomas Pennant, Esquire

Dear Sir,

A pair of honey-buzzards, buteo opivorus, sive vespivorus Raii, built them a large shallow nest, composed of twigs and lined with dead beechen leaves, upon a tall slender beech near the middle of Selborne-hanger, in the summer of 1780. In the middle of the month of June a bold boy climbed this tree, though standing on so steep and dizzy a situation, and brought down an egg, the only one in the nest, which had been sat on for some time, and contained the embrio of a young bird. The egg was smaller, and not so round as those of the common buzzard; was dotted at each end with small red spots, and surrounded in the middle with a broad bloody zone.

The hen-bird was shot, and answered exactly to Mr. Ray's description of that species; had a black cere, short thick legs, and a long tail. When on the wing this species may be easily distinguished from the common buzzard by its hawk-like appearance, small head, wings not so blunt, and longer tail. This specimen contained in its craw some limbs of frogs, and many grey snails without shells. The irides of the eyes of this bird were of a beautiful bright yellow colour.

About the tenth of July in the same summer a pair of sparrow- hawks bred in an old crow's nest on a low beech in the same hanger; and as their brood, which was numerous, began to grow