388 BIRD-LIFE OF THE BORDERS 



world-wide revolution — a cinematograph of infinite bird- 

 travel. Those flights you heard in high heaven yes- 

 treen, possibly never alighted in these islands at all : 

 some that interested you the day before, may now be 

 resting on the Mediterranean : the new-comers that 

 to-morrow will delight your eye, have not yet quitted 

 Scandinavia. 



Some interesting problems have long centred round 

 these little August migrants. Few problems nowadays 

 remain unsolved — that is, few of what may be called ques- 

 tions of fact, though dozens of mere abstruse interest still 

 remain unanswerable. Who, for example, can give reason 

 why the godwit, knot, and curlew-sandpiper should turn 

 rufous - coloured in summer, while the allied curlew, 

 whimbrel, greenshank, and others remain unchanged ? 

 Why should the plovers, the spotted redshank, and 

 the dunlin in summer acquire black breasts, while the 

 common redshank, sanderling, and other waders, re- 

 main white? Such questions will probably some day 

 be solved, since there should be some "first cause" 

 assignable. 



One practical problem, which at the date of the first 

 edition of this book deeply concerned me, has since been 

 solved ; yet the details are still full of interest. Amidst 

 this inrush, by thousands, of wading-birds which every 

 autumn throngs our shores, there were, in my earlier 

 fowling days (not so very remote), at least six species 

 whose far-northern incunabula remained, at that period, 

 practically unknown. These six mysterious migrants 

 included the grey plover and little stint, bar-tailed 

 godwit, knot, sanderling, and curlew-sandpiper. Whence 

 came these six, in successive clouds? None could 

 answer. 



