Miscellanea Curiosa, Vol. 3: containing a collection of curious travels, voyages, and natural histories of countries as they have been delivered in to the Royal SocietyRoyal Society (Great Britain)
History
Miscellanea Curiosa, Vol. 3: containing a collection of curious travels, voyages, and natural histories of countries as they have been delivered in to the Royal Society
Royal Society (Great Britain)
Natural history; Science -- Early works to 1800; Voyages and travels -- Early works to 1800
I have taken care not to bruise the Skull the Membranes were not black
at all, both _Segerus_ and _Severinus_ I think had some perceptions
of the different Structure of a Mole's Ear, but not any thing of its
Analogy to a Bird's Ear; they speak of a Bone _Egregie pumicosum_:
And _Segerus_ says there's a _Ductus ad ossis usque petrosi cavitatem
protensus, plurimis fibrillis Membraneis annectabatur_. But to return,
this Mocking Bird having its Name from _Mimicking_, all other Birds in
singing is a wonderful mettled Bird, bold and brisk, and yet seems to
be of a very tender Constitution, neither singing in Winter, nor in the
midst of Summer, and with much difficulty are any of them brought to
live in _England_.
The Red Mocking is of a duskish red, or rather brown; it sings very
well, but has not so soft a Note as the gray Mocking Bird.
Of _Virginia_ Nightingale, or red Bird, there are two sorts, the Cocks
of both sorts are of a pure Scarlet, the Hens of a Duskish red; I
distinguish them into two sorts, for the one has a tufted Cops on the
Head, the other is smooth-feather'd. I never saw a tufted Cock with a
smooth-headed Hen, or on the contrary; they generally resorting a Cock
and Hen together, and play in a Thicket of Thorns or Bryars in the
Winter, nigh to which the Boys set their Traps, and so catch them and
sell them to the Merchants for about Six Pence apiece; by whom they are
brought for _England_; they are something less than a Thrush.
There's a Bird very injurious to Corn, they call a Blackbird; I look
on it a sort of Starling, for they cry something like them but do not
sing, are much what of the same bigness, have Flesh blackish like
theirs; they resort in great Flocks together, they are as black as
a Crow all over their Bills and all, only some of them have scarlet
Feathers in the Pinions of their Wings. _Quæry_, Whether a distinct
Species?
They have a Lark nothing differing from our common Lark; they have
another Bird which they call a Lark that is much larger, as big as a
Starling, it has a soft Note, feeds on the Ground; and as I remember
has the Specifical Character of a long Heel, it is more inclined to
yellow, and has a large half Moon on its Breast of yellow; if it have
not a long Heel, _Quære_, Whether a Species of the Yellow-hammer?
They have a Martin very like, only larger than ours, that builds after
the same manner. The honourable Col. _Bacon_ has remarked for several
Years, that they constantly come thither upon the Tenth of _March_
one or two of them appearing before, being seen hovering in the Air
for a Day or two then go away, and as he supposed return'd with the
great Flock. The Colonel delighted much in this Bird, and made like
Pidgeon-holes at the end of his House with Boards purposely for them.
Their Swallow differs but little from ours.
They have a Bird they call a Blue-bird, of a curious azure colour about
the bigness of a Chaffinch.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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