THE BOOK OF MIGRATORY BIRDS 53 



In regard to the difference of time of migration of young 

 and old birds, it would be well to quote a remark or two 

 from an excellent authority, viz., "Rodd's Birds of Corn- 

 wall and the Scilly Isles." Speaking of the knot, the 

 author mentions : "I have also noticed that the first flocks 

 of these migratory sandpipers, which usually arrive about 

 the second week in August, are almost entirely composed 

 of young birds. The old birds arrive somewhat later." 

 Referring to the woodcock, the same book says : "When it 

 first comes its flesh is short and tender, whereas afterwards 

 it eats stringy and is of a fibrous flesh, as others of our 

 fowls are." 



Even to the scientist in Nature study it appears 

 mysterious that young birds of, say from eight to ten weeks 

 old are able successfully to complete a lengthy aerial 

 journey of some five hundred miles in the greatest safety. 

 It must be borne in mind that this is a maiden venture, or 

 original undertaking ; yet the same unerring certainty is 

 there as practised by their parents previously. Anyone 

 who on dark, starless nights has heard the babel of voices 

 of these myriads of migrants travelling past him overhead, 

 in one fixed direction and in undiminishing numbers, for 

 weeks and months, without the help of any guiding mark 

 discernible by the human eye, cannot fail to be led by the 

 supreme grandeur of this phenomenon to speculate as to 

 what kind of capacities the unfailing performance of such 

 an act is due. 



For centuries this question has received the most serious 

 consideration on the part of inquirers, but no final solution 

 of the problem has as yet been forthcoming. The greatest 

 amount of investigation of these unknown things produces, 

 seemingly, but the chaos of nothingness; hence, in their 

 perplexity to account for this remarkable phenomenon, 

 scientists and observers have sought refuge in the assump- 

 tion of an "instinctive action" (as Gatke puts it) on the 

 part of birds, in virtue of which they adopted unconsciously 

 the right road towards the attainment of an unknown goal. 

 Alfred Newton's remarks on "Birds" in the "Encyclopaedia 



