THE BIRDS OF HELIGOLAND 317 



annually during both periods of migration. For America Audubon 

 gives three species, one of which — BccjuIhn cnlevdula — has, — accord- 

 ing to Harting, — been once shot in Scotland in the summer of 185cS. 



130. - Golden-crested Wren [GelbkOpfiges Goldhahnchen]. 

 REGULUS FLAVICAPILLUS, Naumann.' 



Heligolandish : Liitj Miiiisk = ii((?c Wren. 



Begulus JlavicapiUus. Naumann, iii. 968. 



Golden-crested Wren. Dresser, ii. 453. 



Roitelet ordinaire. Teniniinck, Mawuel, i. 229, lii. 157. 



It is indeed a matter of wonderment how these tiny birds, 

 apparently endowed with but poor capacity for flight, yet venture 

 merrdy and cheerfully on their journey across the sea, and succeed 

 in acconiplishmg it safely and happily, and that too during the 

 long dark nights of October. And still further, then- migration is 

 performed with perfect regularity year after year, and conducts 

 them not onl}^ in hundreds, but at times in many hundreds f)f 

 thousands, in one night to this island. On the following morning 

 then- merry call-note resounds from the bushes and shrubs of all the 

 gardens, and even the grassy plain of the Upper Plateau teems with 

 them from one end to the other. The rubble, too, at the base of 

 the clili' is alive with them, and they disport themselves merrily 

 among the vessels and boats on the .shore, actively pursuing the 

 acjuatic insects m the sea-wrack which is washed up bj- the tide, 

 even to the very edge of the foaming waves. 



The migration of this little bird commences in spring, towards 

 the end of March — sometimes even rather earlier — and continues to 

 the end of April. The autumn migration begins with September, 

 continues throughout the whole of October, and sometimes even 

 extends into November. 



The bird arrives generall}- in fairly large nundicrs during the 

 autmnn migration, sometimes indeed in truly astonishing quantities, 

 as for instance, among other years, in 1SS2. The earliest individuals 

 appeared on the 8th of September, and the migration proceeded, 

 with occasional interruptions, in moderate numbers throughout the 

 month; with the approach of October, however, a considerable m- 

 crease in the number of migrants took place, the birds appearing 

 daily in very large munbers ; and on the night of the 2Sth the 

 migration assumed such vast dimensions that even an approximate 

 computation of their numbers was quite out of the question. Per- 

 haps the simile of a snowstorm may help to convey an idea of the 



' Reyulus cristaiux, Koch. 



