214 FRANK forester's FIELD SPORTS. 



swamp, where a large spring, which never freezes, bursts out 

 and percolates through the vegetable soil for a distance of a 

 hundred yards, or a little more, before gathering itself into a 

 single channel, I saw at least a hundred birds rise within three 

 minutes. It was very late in the season, the 6th or 8th of No- 

 vembei', and sharp frost had already set in, and it was so late 

 in the afternoon that it was almost dark. I was shooting with 

 a friend, who had a young dog which could not be controlled 

 from running in ; and all the birds were flushed at two rises, 

 each of us getting two double shots. The Woodcock settled 

 down all over the large swamp, but it was too dark to follow 

 lliem ; and the next morning, it having been an intensely hard 

 black frost at night, not a bird was to be found in the country. 

 Had we come upon that flight earlier in the day, and with old, 

 steady dogs, the sport might have been incalculable. 



I have always believed, however, that to be an instance of 

 actual migi'ation ; and I am well satisfied all those birds had 

 dropped in, from a long flight from the north, whence they had 

 been expelled by the severe cold, with no intention of stopping 

 longer than to recruit themselves by a single day's repose. 

 After that night no more birds were seen in that part of the 

 country, until the breaking of the ensuing winter. 



One other point appears to be worthy of remark, with regard 

 to the autumnal migration of Cock, on their way southward, 

 namely, that sometimes, particularly when the winter sets in 

 unusually early and severe on the sea-board, and south of the 

 mountains, the flight of Cock come down all nearly at once, and 

 in one direction, avoiding whole ranges of country, and abso- 

 lutely swarming in other regions. A few seasons since, when 

 the northern and river counties, so far down as Rockland, were 

 covered with snow, which lay two or three days, in the first 

 week of October, no more Woodcock were found that autumn 

 in that district, or in Eastern New Jersey, quite down to the 

 sea, while they literally abounded on the eastern side of the 

 Hudson, and were killed in pi'ofusion throughout Westchester, 

 and even within a few miles of New York city. 



