80 THE BIRDS OF OXFORDSHIRE. 



song' is heard on all sides. In autumn they resort largely to 

 the wet meadows, and in winter flock together on the stubbles, 

 especially those which are planted with clover to follow, and 

 at that season their numbers are often augmented by the arrival 

 of migratory flocks from other parts of the country ; should, 

 however, the weather be very severe, these, and, to a considerable 

 extent, our own birds also, leave us. The Messrs. Matthews 

 state that, ' At the commencement of very severe frost vast 

 flocks of larks leave this part of the kingdom for the south ; 

 on some days, from light to dark, the air is never free from 

 them ; the multitude which pass during that time is almost 

 incredible.^ [Zoologist, p. 2429.) Many of these flocks may 

 have consisted of birds merely passing over the county and 

 coming from further north. Larks do an enormous amount 

 of good, and hardly any injury, to the agriculturist ; all that 

 can be alleged against them being that they are apt to do 

 a little damage among newly-sown oats, as they have ac- 

 quired a bad habit of digging them out of the drills. 



} h 

 THE -WOODLARK. b^ 



Alauda arhorea. 

 The Woodlark is a resident, but of extremely local distri- 

 bution, being found only on certain parts of the Chiltern 

 Hills, although a few are said to breed in the neighbourhood 

 of Babloek-Hithe Ferry, near Standlake, and a female was 

 brought thence to the Rev. H. A. Macpherson in January, 

 1 88 1 [MS. notes); it must, however, be very imcommon in 

 this locality, as Mr. Warner never met with it. In the 

 Chilterns, from the Messrs. Matthews' observations, the Wood- 

 lark appears to be found very sparingly near Stokenchurch 

 and in a few other spots on the range, where it breeds and is 

 resident all the year, being occasionally seen in small flocks 

 of five or six together. [Zoologist, pp. 2597, 2736, and 

 A. Matthews i7i lit.) The Rev. B. D'Oyly Aplin has also 

 seen it near Chinnor, at the foot of the hills, in 1880. 



