What you suggest, with regard to Spain, is highly probable. The
winters of Andalusia are so mild, that, in all likelihood, the soft-
billed birds that leave us at that season may find insects sufficient
to support them there.
Some young man, possessed of fortune, health, and leisure, should
make an autumnal voyage into that kingdom; and should spend a
year there, investigating the natural history of that vast country. Mr.
Willughby * passed through that kingdom on such an errand; but
he seems to have skirted along in a superficial manner and an ill
humour, being much disgusted at the rude, dissolute manners of the
people.
(* See Ray's Travels, p. 466.)
I have no friend left now at Sunbury to apply to about the swallows
roosting on the aits of the Thames: nor can I hear any more about
those birds which I suspected were merulae torquatae,.
As to the small mice, I have farther to remark, that though they
hang their nests for breeding up amidst the straws of the standing
corn, above the ground; yet I find that, in the winter, they burrow
deep in the earth, and make warm beds of grass: but their grand
rendezvous seems to be in corn-ricks, into which they are carried at
harvest.
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