EATEN BY BIRDS. 261 



are comparatively tame : afterward, though the 

 flights may be large, they become wild ; and the 

 flesh, assuming its darkness, manifests that their 

 food has not been farinaceous. The distant foreign 

 migrations, which have been stated to take place 

 from the meadows of the Severn, I believe to be 

 only these inland trips ; and that the supposed mi- 

 grators returned to those stations fat and in good 

 condition, owing to their having fed during their 

 absence on the nutricious berry of the white thorn. 

 I have several times seen the fruit on our hedges 

 refused by these birds, and this too in no very tem- 

 perate season ; but in all these cases, the summer 

 had been ungenial the berries had not ripened 

 well, they were nipped by the frosts of October, and 

 hung on the sprays dark in colour, small, and juice- 

 less in substance. The summer of 1825 produced 

 the finest and largest haws I ever remember. They 

 were in general of a bright red hue, and filled with 

 farinaceous pulp ; and in consequence, though the 

 season was uncommonly mild and open, long before 

 Christmas, little wandering parties of these birds 

 consumed the whole of them. 



Perfectly gregarious as the fieldfare is, yet we 

 observe every year, in some tall hedge-row, or little, 

 quiet pasture, two or three of them, that have with- 

 drawn from the main flocks, and there associate 

 with the blackbird and the thrush. They do not 

 appear to be wounded birds, which from necessity 

 have sought concealment and quiet, but to have 

 retired from inclination ; and I have reason to ap- 



