ii8 STUDIES IN LIFE AND SENSE. 



eggs, at short intervals, in different nests, and the young are thus bom 

 at different periods, a circumstance which favours the unimpeded 

 home -flight of the birds. The swallows and swifts are migratory 

 birds of world- wide fame. The swallows arrive in . Britain at the 

 end of March or beginning of April, and appear to cross the Channel 

 either singly or in small groups. Two broods are produced in each year 

 by the swallow, and it has been occasionally observed that the young 

 of the second brood have been left to perish, owing to their imma- 

 ture state when the period for flying southward arrived, the migratory 

 instinct thus overruling the parental affection of the birds. The 

 swifts arrive in Britain at the end of April, leaving their home in 

 Northern Africa at a period when a genial climate prevails, and when 

 their insect food is plentiful. By the end of May the young are 

 hatched, and at the beginning of July parents and progeny are 

 circling rapidly in their graceful evolutions, as if preparing for their 

 southward flight, which occurs shortly after the date just named. 

 Amongst our common and smaller birds which present us with more 

 or less typical examples of migration are the skylarks, redbreasts, 

 song thrushes, blackbirds, and many other birds not usually regarded 

 as migrants. It is a well-ascertained fact, however, that these birds 

 fly southwards to the shores of the Mediterranean Sea and to 

 Southern Europe generally in winter, and the causes of their south- 

 ward movements are by no means clear, if we consider that the 

 conditions of existence in Britain during winter are by no means of 

 hard or unbearable nature to such species. The quails present 

 examples of migrants belonging to a group of birds widely different 

 from those which include the examples just mentioned. These birds 

 leave the North African and Mediterranean coasts in spring, and fly 

 to Europe in large numbers ; their plump condition at the migratory 

 period forming a quality of disadvantageous character to the species, 

 on which a constant war is made in the interests of gastronomy at 

 large. 



Amongst more peculiar features in connection with the migration 

 of birds may be mentioned the attachment which many species exhibit 

 for their former habitations. Swallows are known to dwell year by 

 year in the same places, and the water-wagtail will select the same 

 spot annually for its nest. An instance is related of such attachment 

 being exemplified by two stone curlews ( (Edicnemus crepitans) a 

 species of bird inhabiting the open country which year by year 

 repaired to the same nest, and this, although the character of the 

 surroundings had become entirely altered. The nest had origi- 

 nally been situated in a rabbit warren, and in the lapse of years the 

 warren had been gradually replaced by a flourishing plantation of 

 young trees ; the curlews, however, remaining steadfast to their 

 annual quarters, despite the altered character of their home. The 



