2 56 THE MIGRATION OF BIRDS. 



9 a.m. to I p.m. A "succession of clouds" 

 of Starlings also passed by overhead. On the 

 East coast of England similar inrushes were 

 remarked on days exactly corresponding. Again, 

 in the same autumn we find that '' immense rushes " 

 of Starlings appeared on our eastern coasts during 

 the latter half of October, by day and night. At 

 HeHgoland, Gatke remarks of this species : 

 " enorm^ous numbers" crossed between the 14th and 

 25th, especially on the 19th, "immense numbers" ; 

 on the 20th," clouds of enormous numbers" ; 21st, 

 "astounding"; 22nd, "astounding flights, like 

 clouds passing on." The autumn influx of 

 Goldcrests is even more astonishing, when we bear 

 in mind that this bird is the smallest Palaearctic 

 Sj)ecies. From the Isle of May to the Channel 

 Islands broad waves of this migrant strike our 

 eastern and southern coasts, in varying numbers. 

 In the autumn of 1882 this little bird reached. 

 Western Europe in marvellous numbers. Right 

 through October they continued to arrive in 

 enormous multitudes, two rushes being very 

 pronounced, one on the night of the 7th and the 

 morning of the 8th, the other on the night of the 

 1 2th and the morning of the 13th. At Heligoland, 

 on the 28th and 29th, Gatke records : " a perfect 

 storm of Goldcrests we have had — poor little souls ! 

 ■ — perching on the ledges of the window-panes of the 

 lantern of our lighthouse, preening their feathers in 

 the glare of the lamps ; on the 29th, all the island 

 swarmed with them, filling the gardens everywhere, 



