296 SAXICOLA CENANTHE. 



observed to come in flocks ; and it is the general opinion that 

 they come in the night. These birds usually sell for a shilling 

 a dozen ; and it is a common custom in those parts where they 

 are taken to visit the trap, take the bird out, and leave a 

 penny in each as a reward for the shepherd." 



Mr William Markwick, in the fourth volume of the Linneean 

 Transactions, states that being found in great plenty on the 

 South Downs, and being justly esteemed a great delicacy for 

 the table, " vast numbers of them are annually caught by the 

 shepherds as they tend their flocks. These Wheatear traps 

 consist of horse-hair nooses, placed under a sod of turf dug out 

 of the ground for that purpose. They are set up every year on 

 St. James's day, the 25th of July, soon after which time they 

 are caught in numbers truly astonishing, when we reflect that 

 it is a solitary bird, more than two or three being scarcely ever 

 found together. Observing that all the birds which are caught 

 in the proper season had the same coloured plumage as the hen 

 birds, I made some inquiries respecting them of a shepherd at 

 Eastbourn, who informed me that the flights consisted chiefly 

 of young birds, which arrived in the greatest numbers when a 

 westerly wind prevailed, and that they always came against 

 the wind. He told me that on the 15th and 16th of August 

 1792 he caught twenty-seven dozen with only a few old birds 

 amongst them ; but this is a small number compared with the 

 almost incredible quantity sometimes taken. A gentleman in- 

 formed me that his father''s shepherd once caught eighty-four 

 dozen in one day. Early in the spring only a few old birds 

 are to be seen, and none (that I could ever observe) in the 

 winter. I enquired of the shepherd whether these birds breed 

 on the South Downs ; the answer was, a few only." 



Young. — The young when newly fledged are coloured as fol- 

 lows. The upper parts are light greyish -brown, the central part 

 of each feather on the head paler ; the rump white, most of the 

 feathers tipped with brown. The lower parts are light greyish- 

 ochre, the feathers of the neck and breast tipped with brown. 

 The band over the eye is indistinct, and the dark band on the 

 side of the head is wanting ; the smaller wing-coverts are 

 dusky with greyish-yellow margins ; the larger coverts, alula, 



