River- Warblers. 5 7 



the only species of River-warblers that are known 

 to visit England regularly every year ; these two, 

 the Sedge-warbler and the Reed-warbler, never 

 fail, and the Sedge-warbler comes in very large 

 numbers, but only a few specimens of other 

 River-warblers have been found out in their 

 venturesomeness. Still, every young bird-hunter 

 should acquaint himself with the characteristics of 

 the rarer visitors, in order to qualify himself for 

 helping to throw light on what is still rather a 

 dark corner of English ornithology. These same 

 species which we so seldom see are swarming in 

 the flat lands of Holland, close by us, and why 

 should they not come over to the island which 

 birds seem to love so dearly ? 



But there is no doubt that birds have ways, and 

 reasons for them, which man is very unlikely ever 

 to be able to understand. Why, as Mr. Harting 

 asks, 1 should the Reed-warbler be so much less 

 " generally distributed " than the Sedge- warbler ? 

 That it is so, we can show well enough even from 

 Oxford alone. You will find Sedge-warblers all 

 along the Cherwell and the I sis, wherever there 

 1 Our Summer Migrants, p. 82. 



