In Forest and Copse. 155 



Nightingale penetrates as far north as the Plain of 

 York, perhaps exceptionally beyond, but it is rare 

 enouofh in the neiijhbourhood of Sheffield, and we 

 never had the good fortune to meet with it there 

 during a residence of nearly twenty years, although 

 we know the Sedge Warbler has not unfrequently 

 been mistaken for it. A member of one of the allied 

 genera, however, is common enough, we mean the 

 gay and lively Redstart — the showiest, perhaps, of 

 all the migrant band. In the coppice just above 

 Bell Hagg the Redstart was very common. The 

 Wheatear bred in the quarries there, but the Red- 

 start loved the range of rocks that ran bulwark-like 

 along the valley above the copse. We used to find 

 its nest in the crevices of these rocks, as well as in 

 holes among the birch-trees. We remember one 

 nest in a decayed birch that contained eight eggs 

 ranged neatly round in rows; another beneath the 

 rock, at the top of Blackbrook, that bears an inscrip- 

 tion to the effect that upon it Elliott the "corn-law 

 rhymer" used to sit and write his poetry. Both 

 Redstart and Wheatear are only birds of summer 

 in our islands, the latter arriving perhaps a week 

 before the former, in April. The three species of 

 Willow Wren must also be included in this brief 

 resume of bird-life in the northern woods. Com- 

 monest of this charminc: trio we must class the 

 Willow Wren. Our northern woods from April 



