154 WjifMBLES OF A 



are some which are very marked features in the winter 

 scenery. Such are the two migratory thrushes, the 

 redwing and the fieldfare, whose names, in spite of 

 considerable difference in their dress and habits, we so 

 often link together. The dull December shore would be 

 desolate indeed without its smart oyster-catchers, its 

 musical, quiet-tinted plovers, its clouds of sandpipers, 

 now flying fast along the sea, now wheeling with the 

 silver gleam of a myriad upturned wings, and now with 

 plaintive cries scattering on the yellow sand. Welcome 

 even are the fleets of ducks that ride in thousands on the 

 long grey waves, the bold clear colouring of their hand- 

 some plumage rising and falling on the heaving sea. 



