228 BIRD-LIFE OF THE BORDERS 



first noticed this on October 23rd, 1880, when happening 

 on an army of migrating fieldfares. I was hidden by a 

 loughside, awaiting a "drive" of ducks, and many of 

 the fieldfares, flying low over the heather, passed within a 

 foot or two of my head as I lay concealed. On two subse- 

 quent occasions I have heard this peculiar note by day, as 

 well as at night. Redwings also, when arriving, keep up 

 a constant chirping chatter. 



Neither of these birds winter among the hills. Red- 

 wings, especially, make a very short stay, merely resting 

 for a day or two to feed on fell-berries and in marshy 

 meadows, before passing onwards to more cultivated 

 regions. In mild seasons a few fieldfares occasionally 

 remain throughout the winter. 



Woodcocks on first arrival sometimes pitch down 

 among the heather, far out on the open moor- — just as the 

 jacksnipes had done a month previously. The earliest of 

 these distinctly foreign arrivals that I recollect finding 

 thus, was on October 2nd. 



On October 8th, 1879, I came across what is now a 

 rare bird on the Northumbrian moors, a hen-harrier, an 

 adult male, pale ash-blue. The hawk had struck down a 

 grouse, obviously on the wing, and was busy devouring it 

 in a deep black ravine, or peat chasm, into which the 

 grouse had fallen, when my setter pointed the pair of them 

 from the opposite side. The harrier rose from almost 

 beneath my feet, with a wild scream, his yellow claws 

 dangling below him. The head of the grouse had been 

 completely severed and lay some distance lower down the 

 ravine. It is worth adding that in beating up- wind to 

 where we found the harrier (which was on one of the 

 highest ridges of that fell), the grouse had been "lying" 

 — a most unusual occurrence at that period — and my 



