BIRDS OF THE WAVE AND WOODLAND 



15 



Some naturalists want us to call it a migrant, and in proof 

 of their argument, tell us of the multitudes that pass over 

 Heligoland at a certain time of the year. But against this. 



let every one who has a gar- 

 den where thrushes build, bear 

 witness how, in the hardest 

 winters, the dead birds are 

 picked up among the laurels, 

 starved or frozen to death. This 

 alone demolishes the miorant 

 theory. That numbers do leave 

 England in winter may be true enough ; it is the overflow 

 of population. 



Indeed, if the superfluous songsters did not go away 

 (and the Wild Birds' Protection Act remained in force), we 

 should be smothered with thrushes. I know, for instance, 

 of a little " place " in the country, some thirty acres all 



