e Continent, that the inhabitants pay the bishop
his stipend out of the profits arising from the sale of them.

The flights of these birds across the Mediterranean are recorded near three
thousand years ago. "There went forth a wind from the Lord and brought
quails from the sea, and let them fall upon the camp, a day's journey round
about it, and they were two cubits above the earth," (Numbers, chap. ii.
ver. 31.)

In our country, Mr. Pennant informs us, that some quails migrate, and
others only remove from the internal parts of the island to the coasts,
(Zoology, octavo, 210.) Some of the ringdoves and stares breed here, others
migrate, (ibid. 510, ii.) And the slender billed small birds do not all
quit these kingdoms in the winter, though the difficulty of procuring the
worms and insects, that they feed on, supplies the same reason for
migration to them all, (ibid. 511.)

Linnaeus has observed, that in Sweden the female chaffinches quit that
country in September, migrating into Holland, and leave their mates behind
till their return in spring. Hence he has called them Fringilla caelebs,
(Amaen. Acad. ii. 42. iv. 595.) Now in our climate both sexes of them are
perennial birds. And Mr. Pennant observes that the hoopoe, chatterer,
hawfinch, and crossbill, migrate into England so rarely, and at such
uncertain times, as not to deserve to be ranked among our birds of passage,
(ibid. 511.)

The water fowl, as geese and ducks, are better adapted for long migrations,
than the other tribes of birds, as, when the weather is calm, they can not
only rest themselves, or sleep upon the ocean, but possibly procure some
kind of food from it.

Hence in Siberia, as soon as the lakes are frozen, the water fowl, which
are very numerous, all disappear, and are supposed to fly to warmer
climates, except the rail, which, from its inability for long flights,
probably sleeps, like our bat, in their winter. The following account from
the Journey of Professor Gmelin, may entertain the reader. "In the
neighbourhood of Krasnoiark, amongst many other emigrant water fowls, we
observed a great number of rails, which when pursued never took flight, but
endeavoured to escape by running. We enquired how these birds, that could
not fly, could retire into other countries in the winter, and were told,
both by the Tartars and Assanians, that they well knew those birds could
not alone pass into other countries: but when the cranes (les grues) retire
in