86 BIRD-LIFE OF THE BORDERS 



Africa and back (eight transits in all — -say 30,000 miles). 

 This would be a marvellous record for a bird of such 

 insignificant wing-power. We know little or nothing, as 

 yet, of migration ; but the inference is that its dangers 

 must be much less than are apparent. 



This spring (1906), a pair of spotted flycatchers are 

 also occupying the same site in which they nested in 1903 

 — their fourth consecutive season. 



May 21 (1887V — After several days of bitter northerly 

 gales, the hills this morning lay pure white with snow — 

 only a month from midsummer day ! Yet even this Arctic 

 record was surpassed in 1903, when at midsummer itself 

 — from June 19th to 21st— we had severe frosts on three 

 consecutive nights, following on N. and N.-E. gales. 

 Ferns and bracken were blighted, so also the young 

 shoots of spruce (but not Scotch fir), and indeed much of 

 the delicate young frondage now just at its birth. By 

 mid- July, I noticed that a new growth of bracken, 

 springing away from the roots, was replacing that de- 

 stroyed at midsummer. Such is the power of Nature's 

 recuperation. 



As a coincidence, it may be recorded that on the 

 same date in the present year, we had a similar snow- 

 storm. I quote the following from the Daily Telegraph 

 of May 21st, 1906. "In the extreme north of England, 

 the weather is . . . intensely cold. In some parts of 

 Northumberland, snow is lying to a depth of 18 inches. 

 The white-capped hills present an extraordinary contrast 

 with the verdure and blossom of the valleys." 



May 24. — The first young grouse seen on the wing. 

 Though barely ten days old, and no bigger than sparrows, 

 yet with the wind under their tiny pinions, and the fall of 

 the hill, one or two went quite 200 yards. 



