148 LOCAL JOTTINGS. 



I was led most particularly to make this observation. March and April, up 

 to the middle of the latter month, were almost unpreecdently warm, fine, 

 and still; and on the 5th. of April, as I was walking with my ftither in 

 the fields, I was attracted by a well-known /twitter' overhead, and there 

 was a Swallow toying about at a short height just over us; I suppose we 

 watched him for a quarter of an hour. 



When we returned home, we were sauntering round our shrubbery, and a 

 Blackcap came out of the laurels, and perched on a bare Mountain Ash, 

 higher than the other shrubs, as I have observed to be their wont, and 

 sang delightfully. The Chiff-ChafF I think I never heard so noisy, if it is 

 not an improper expression, and one in particular all through March seemed 

 never weary of telling his whereabouts, at the top of some lofty beeches, from 

 morn till night. 



On the 6th., a little girl from the village, (Sunninghill,) brought word 

 that she had heard the Cuckoo, and my brother the same day heard it too. 

 The Whitethroats soon made themselves heard in the hedge-rows, and the 

 Wryneck, which always haunts an old thorn near our grassplot, was more 

 garrulous than usual, (by the way, it is about us called the Pea or Pee- 

 bird, I suppose because its note is like ^pee, pee, pee,' often repeated.) From 

 this time I occasionally saw a Swallow, and the Cuckoo was heard at 

 intervals, but on the 20th. rain, which we had had none of for nearly ten 

 weeks, came, and with it a total change of weather, which became so cold 

 that icicles several inches long hung from our spouts, and the leaves of 

 all the young Chesnut trees and Fuschias were cut off as black as tea-leaves. 



Not a summer bird was to be seen; of course they were somewhere ^sad 

 and silent,' but they hid themselves marvellously well; no Cuckoo, no Swallows, 

 no Whitethroats or Willow Wrens, no Blackcap, in short winter had 

 returned with its dead silence, and I expected to find my solitary Swallow 

 dead by the pond-side, like the youth in ^sop; one Swallow truly does not 

 make a summer! Even my pretty Chiff-chaff seemed out of spirits, and even 

 the return of warm weather, upon which, however, we must not plume our- 

 selves, has not restored our early visitors, but I suppose they will shew 

 themselves again shortly. May the 2nd. was a cheering day, and the 

 genial rain will set all going again* I heard sweet Luscinia in a copse as I 

 drove to the station. 



Lincolns-Inn-Fields, May Sid., 1854, 



LOCAL JOTTINGS.— No. 12. 



DORCHESTER— DORSETSHIRE, 



BY JOHN GARLAND, ESQ., memb: ent: soc:, memb: wekn: club. 



Spring Appearances. — The weather having been unusually mild and beautiful 

 of late in this neighbourhood. I am enabled to record the following appearances 

 etc., from my notes this year. 



