191 2. A^ofes. 247 



nor the equally isolated case of the Wryneck shot in Colonel Tottenham's 

 Co. WickloAv demesne in the spring of 1895. As against these evidently 

 exceptional occnrrences, we have Mr. Barrington's records of eight Pied 

 Flycatchers and live Wrynecks, killed at light -stations, all in autumn, 

 while the Lesser Whitethroat, Reed Warbler, and Red -backed Shrike, 

 have each been sent to him twice in autumn, never in spring, and Professor 

 Patten has himself lately added two to the list of the Reed Warbler's 

 autumnal occurrences, making them altogether four. 



This tendency to come to the lights in autumn, and not in spring, is, 

 I need hardlv sav, extremely significant. It is, as the readers of Mr, 

 Barrington's book know, quite the reverse of what happens in the case of 

 birds actually known to visit Ireland for breeding purposes. These come 

 to the lanterns chiefly in spring. Mr. Barrington's records, extending 

 as they do over a long series of years, must be fairly conclusive as to the 

 proportions in which the different species occur at the lights at both 

 seasons. (The fact that Prof-ssor Patten has, by special effort, collected 

 some of the scarcer species in comparatively larger numbers does not 

 affect the question, since it is obvious that he might by similar methods 

 collect the more common kinds in yet greater abundance, and the pro- 

 portions, on which the main conclusions depend, would, doubtless, remain 

 very much the same). And Mr. Barrington's records bring out nothing 

 more clearly than the fact that every species of migrant, whether an 

 autumnal or a spring visitant, comes to the lanterns in much greater 

 numbers at its season of arrival than at its time of departure. The 

 spring visitants, notwithstanding such obvious facts as that their nurbers 

 must have largely increased during their stay here, and that a young 

 bird must, ceteris parUnts, be more liable to misadventure than the adult, 

 yield at their time of departure only a third of the number of victims they 

 furnished on their arrival. With the winter visitants, for reasons easily 

 guessed, the disproportion is greater still. But the fact stands out that 

 no bird whose occurrences at the light -stations have hitherto been only 

 autumnal can reasonably be presumed to rank among our spring visitants. 

 We must wait till the light -stations begin to yield it in spring. For 

 the present, analogy groups the Tree-Pipit (as an Irish bird) not merely 

 with the Pied Flycatcher, Red-backed Shrike, Lesser Whitethroat, Reed 

 Warbler, and Wryneck, which, like itself, breed regularly in England, 

 but also, in a sense, with such wanderers from greater distances to our 

 lights as the Red-breasted Flycatcher, Woodchat Shrike, Yellow-browed 

 Warbler, Aquatic Warbler, Pallas's Grasshopper -Warbler, Barred Warbler, 

 Rufous Warbler, Melodious Warbler, Little Bunting, and Short-toed 

 Lark ; since all these, by the cumulative evidence cf their autumnal 

 occurrences, detected in most cases by inexperienced observers, and not 

 matched by any corresponding list of unexpected spring stragglers, yield 

 convincing testimony to the strength of the autumnal westward -wandering 

 habit, and make it a matter of no difficulty at all to understand why birds 

 living so much nearer to our shores should sometimes, at the same season, 

 take the same course. 



Dublin. C. B. Moffat. 



