258 HABITS AND INSTINCTS OP ANIMALS. CHAP. VIII. 



all, with the exception of the quails, are of insectivorous 

 families. The northern land birds, on the contrary, 

 which migrate southward during summer, are chiefly 

 granivorous, and are never seen in Sicily, the situation 

 of which island we found peculiarly favourable for 

 making observations on this subject. Of all the Euro- 

 pean birds, the quail 

 (fig. 72.) is the most re- 

 markable, on account of 

 the vast numbers which 

 s congregate on these oc- 

 casions. For a few weeks 

 in the month of April, 

 when they first begin to 

 arrive in Sicily, every 

 body is a sportsman. These birds always fly against the 

 wind, and perform their journey during the night ; at 

 least they always arrive at that season on the shores of 

 Sicily and Greece ; and although not a quail could be seen 

 the evening before, the next morning the reports of guns 

 in all directions attest their number, and the havoc that 

 has begun upon them. The same winds which are fa- 

 vourable to the quails, are equally so to the bee-eaters 

 (Jferops Apiaster}, the hoopoes (Upupa Epops), the 

 rollers (Coracias garrula Lin.), and the orioles (Oriolus 

 galbula) ; but whether these are also nocturnal in their 

 migrations may reasonably be doubted ; they are all, 

 however, emigrants from the South. The European 

 chatterer (Ampelis garrulus], the fieldfare (Turdus pi- 

 laris Lin.), the red wing (T.iliacus Lin.), and nearly all 

 our small seed-eating birds (Fringillidd), migrate from 

 north to south, to avoid the excessive cold of the arctic 

 regions. There is nothing, therefore, extraordinary in 

 the linnet being stationary with us, and migratory in 

 Greenland, since it can bear the winter climate of one, 

 but not of the other, country. Such are the chief and 

 best known facts regarding the European birds ; and 

 we find those of North America subject to the same 

 laws : the summer tribes which visit the United States 



