Page:White - The natural history of Selborne, and the naturalist's calendar, 1879.djvu/58

36 animal matter. Of the rat proper there are two species, the original black English rat, which is exceedingly rare, and the Norway rat, which is the one now so common. It has completely ousted the black rat.

$e7$ This hawk was apparently a variety of the Peregrine Falcon.

  LETTER XI.

, September 9th, 1767.



will not be without impatience that I shall wait for your thoughts with regard to falco; as to its weight, breadth, etc., I wish I had set them down at the time; but, to the best of my remembrance, it weighed two pounds and eight ounces, and measured, from wing to wing, thirty-eight inches. Its cere and feet were yellow, and the circle of its eyelids a bright yellow. As it had been killed some days, and the eyes were sunk, I could make no good observation on the colour of the pupils and the irides.

The most unusual birds I ever observed in these parts were a pair of hoopoes (upupa), which came several years ago in the