78 THE BIRDS OF OXFORDSHIRE. 



lower grounds, tlie greater number breed in the dry corn-fields. 

 A little party of these birds, with their brilliant yellow 

 colouring', on their arrival in spring, whether on the red-brown 

 ploughings, or the fresh green pastures, is a pretty sight. 

 Occasionally Yellow Wagtails arrive in very large numbers. 

 Mr. W. W. Fowler wrote to me of an assemblage seen in 

 Port Meadow on the 26th April, 1887, 'At every step they 

 flew up from under the bank, and as I looked ahead with the 

 glass the bank was dotted with them. I should say there 

 were five himdred in half a mile of river'' [in lit.). They 

 congregate again before their departure in autumn, and it was 

 doubtless to this species that Gilbert White referred in his 

 third letter to Daines Barrington, ' I saw at the time men- 

 tioned [July] many hundreds of young Wagtails on the banks 

 of the Cherwell, which almost covered the meadows.^ 



THE TKEE PIPIT. 0^^ 



Anthus trhialis. 



The Tree Pipit is a summer visitor and fairly abimdant, 

 arriving about the second week in April. Preferring perhaps 

 the slopes of the hills, and the bottoms of the smaller valleys, 

 it seldom wanders far from its chosen haunt, and having once 

 fixed upon some row of elms or spreading oak, near which 

 upon the ground its mate will have her nest, the male may 

 be seen uttering his sweet song from its topmost bough, or 

 springing into the air to deliver it in his characteristic 

 fashion, day after day all tlu'ough the late spring and early 

 simimer. 



THE MEADOW PIPIT. 0\ 



Anthus pratensis. 



The Meadow Pipit is a resident species, but comparatively 

 few pairs remain to breed ; those that do so seem to prefer the 

 higher grounds, and I have noticed that the fields in the 

 neighbourhood of Tadmarton Heath especially are frequented 



