The Scottish Naturalist. 95 



migrants, as also among our resident birds. Mr. Gould men- 

 tions a remarkable instance of this in Cornwall, from whence 

 Mr. E. H. Rodd, writing to him from Penzance, under date of 

 Jan. 8th 1867, says " I foresaw that there was hard weather 

 somewhere, although the thermometor never shewed a greater 

 amount of frost than one degree ; for sixty miles to the eastward, 

 the reading was nine degrees above zero, and the next day- 

 only five. The heavy weather to the eastward has driven 

 millions of Linnets, Starlings, Larks, Redwings, Fieldfares, 

 Peewits, and Golden Plovers to this district." And Mr. Gould, 

 who was at the time on a visit to Lord Falmouth at Tregothnan, 

 says that the destruction of these birds was immense ; that he 

 himself saw lying dead on the frozen snow, hundreds of Starl- 

 ings, Song-Thrushes, Missel-Thrushes, Redwings, and Fieldfares, 

 but none of the Common Blackbird. Some of our winter 

 migrants have not the constitutional hardiness of others ; thus 

 the RedAving often quits this neighbourhood during the winter 

 months, proceeding further south ; while its congener, the 

 Fieldfare, generally braves out the severest of our winters. 



Some birds though hardy enough never to leave us in winter, 

 and thereby becoming residents, are forced on the Continent 

 where the cold is much greater, to become migratory. Thus 

 the Blackbird, the Robin, the little Golden-crested Wren, and 

 many others have to perform a regular migration, even crossing 

 the Mediterranean to the shores of Africa. The late Capt. 

 Sperling, R. N., mentions his having met the Robin crossing the 

 Mediterranean in three or four instances '^ : — one on its northern 

 migration from Africa April nth, at 30 miles distant from the 

 coast of Sardinia, the nearest land ; two on their southern 

 migration on the ist Oct. the nearest land being 105 miles from 

 the Island of Zante, with a north-westerly breeze, which would 

 land them probably in a i^\\ hours on the coast of Tripoli ; and 

 lastly, another on the 12th of September, also on its southern 

 migration, 55 miles from the coast of Sicily. The Rev. Canon 

 Tristram, of whom we may safely say there is not a more 

 observing ornithologist and no better authority, says, in his 

 remarks on the Ornithology of Palestine (Ibis 1865, p. 75.) " It 

 may be observed that those species which have the most ex- 

 tended northerly, have also the most extended southerly range ; 

 and that those which resort to the hiejhest latitude for nidi- 



^&' 



Ibis 1864 — P- 290. 



