78 The Alps in June. 



It is indeed wonderful to notice the strange dispro- 

 portion between the abundance of food provided 

 and the numbers of the birds who avail themselves 

 of the repast : there is so much more to eat than 

 can ever possibly be eaten. 



But we must remember that this is the case 

 only during the warm months. During the 

 greater part of the year the snow is on the 

 ground in the regions of which I am speaking, 

 and hardly any birds are to be found there. A 

 great and general migration takes place, either to 

 the valleys below, or out of the mountain region 

 altogether, southward, or in a very few cases, 

 northward. Switzerland is, in fact, an admirable 

 centre for the study of migration ; migration, that 

 is, on a large scale, where the birds leave the 

 country entirely, and also on that limited scale 

 which we call in England ' partial ' migration. I 

 believe that the Alps will some day win the 

 attention of the ornithologists as being one of the 

 best of all positions as a centre of observation. 

 We will pause for a moment to glance at it in this 

 light. 



We need hardly look at the map to see that the 



